Relationship between microaspiration of gastric contents and ventilator-associated pneumonia

Incidence of microaspiration of gastric contentsAspiration of gastric contents is common in critically ill patients, and has been identified as a risk factor for ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP).A prospective m u l t i c e n t e r s t u d y, u s i n g p e p s i n a s a m a r k e r o f microaspiration of gastric content reported that 88.9% of the 360 included patients experienced at least one episode of microaspiration (1).However, in many patients this event is not followed by any negative impact on patient outcome.The recent multicenter BestCuff study reported that 67% of patients had abundant microaspiration of gastric contents, defined by the presence of pepsin in at least 30% of tracheal aspirates (2). Pathophysiology and diagnosis of gastric content microaspiration