PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Angela C King
TI  - Long-Term Home Mechanical Ventilation in the United States
AID  - 10.4187/respcare.01741
DP  - 2012 Jun 01
TA  - Respiratory Care
PG  - 921--932
VI  - 57
IP  - 6
4099  - http://rc.rcjournal.com/content/57/6/921.short
4100  - http://rc.rcjournal.com/content/57/6/921.full
AB  - Patients requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation are rapidly increasing in number. Improved ICU care has resulted in many patients surviving acute respiratory failure to require prolonged mechanical ventilation during convalescence. Also, mechanical ventilation is increasingly used as a therapeutic option for patients with symptomatic chronic hypoventilation, with an increased effort to predict nocturnal hypoventilation to initiate ventilation earlier. There are continued efforts by ventilator manufacturers to improve home ventilators. These factors point to a likely increase in the number of patients receiving home mechanical ventilation in the United States. Unfortunately, there are no comprehensive databases or national registry of home ventilator patients—therefore the number of home ventilator patients is unknown. There are real challenges to providing mechanical ventilation in the home, which include caregiver training, adequacy of respiratory care, and reimbursement.