Incidence of ventilator-associated pneumonia and its related risk factors in patients ‎admitted to neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) ‎

Ventilator-associated pneumonia is defined as inflammation of the lung parenchyma due to infectious agent activity 48 hours after the start of mechanical ventilation in patients who have tracheal intubation and did not have pneumonia at the time of intervention. Due to the lack of local information available, the high mortality rate and the results of this study can help improve child care standards under mechanical ventilation in NICU. The aim of this study was to investigate the incidence of ventilator-associated pneumonia and its related risk factors in patients admitted to neonatal intensive care unit (NICU)  in  Ardabil city hospital.

This descriptive cross- sectional study was performed on 100 neonates admitted to NICU of Bu-Ali hospital in Ardabil city in 2018. For each neonates, necessary information were collected by a checklist including incidence of ventilator-associated pneumonia and related risk factors. Collected data were analyzed by statistical methods in SPSS version 19.

In this study, 100 neonates admitted to NICU of Ardabil city hospital, 61% of them were boys and the rest were girls. Out of all neonates, 48% had ventilator-associated pneumonia. There was a significant relationship between duration of mechanical ventilation time and the incidence of ventilator-