Randomized trial comparing daily interruption of sedation and nursing-implemented sedation algorithm in medical intensive care unit patients

Table 2 Baseline characteristics for patients randomly assigned to daily interruption of sedation (DIS) and sedation algorithm (SA)

	DIS n = 36	SA n = 38	P value
Age in years, mean (95% CI)	52 (47.4, 56.5)	51 (46.8, 55.8)	0.84
Gender, female	19	20	0.99
Race, African-American/white/other	18/17/1	20/17/1	0.97
Reason for mechanical ventilation			0.52
Pneumonia/Acute lung injury	17	14
Sepsis	6	5
Delirium/neurologic	5	6
Cardiac	2	6
Asthma/Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease	1	2
Other	5	5
APACHE II score	26 (22.9, 28.8)	24 (21.6, 27.4)	0.52
Sequential Organ Failure Assessment score	10 (8.2, 10.9)	9 (7.6, 10.3)	0.50
Midazolam equivalents before randomization in mg/kg, median (IQR)	0.5 (0.05, 2.61)	0.6 (0.0, 3.73)	0.81
Fentanyl equivalents before randomization in μg/kg, median (IQR)	0.4 (0.0, 2.93)	0.8 (0.0, 2.27)	0.52
Propofol before randomization in μg/kg, median (IQR)	90 (0, 29,625)	0 (0, 49,956)	0.79
Awake, number	13	14	0.95
Richmond Agitation-Sedation Scale score, mean (95% CI)	-3 (-3.4, -2.3)	-3 (-3.0, -2.0)	0.37

APACHE II, Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II; CI, confidence interval; IQR, interquartile range.

ISSN: 1364-8535