• Zhi Mao, Ling Gao, Guoqi Wang, Chao Liu, Yan Zhao, Wanjie Gu, Hongjun Kang, and Feihu Zhou.
• Department of Critical Care Medicine, Chinese People's Liberation Army General Hospital, 28 Fu-Xing Road, Beijing, 100853, People's Republic of China.
• Crit Care. 2016 Oct 28; 20 (1): 353.

BackgroundPotential benefits of subglottic secretion suction for preventing ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) are not fully understood.MethodsWe searched Cochrane Central, PubMed, and EMBASE up to March 2016 to identify randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that compared subglottic secretion suction versus non-subglottic secretion suction in adults with mechanical ventilation. Meta-analysis was conducted using Revman 5.3, trial sequential analysis (TSA) 0.9 and STATA 12.0. The primary outcome was incidence of VAP. The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) was used to evaluate the level of evidence.ResultsTwenty RCTs (N = 3544) were identified. Subglottic secretion suction was associated with reduction of VAP incidence in four high quality trials (relative risk (RR) 0.54, 95 % confidence interval (CI) 0.40-0.74; p < 0.00001) and in all trials (RR = 0.55, 95 % CI 0.48- 0.63; p < 0.00001). Sensitivity analyses did not show differences in the pooled results. Additionally, the results of the above-mentioned analyses were confirmed in TSA. GRADE level was high. Subglottic secretion suction significantly reduced incidence of early onset VAP, gram-positive or gram-negative bacteria causing VAP, and duration of mechanical ventilation. It delayed the time-to-onset of VAP. However, no significant differences in late onset VAP, intensive care unit (ICU) mortality, hospital mortality, or ICU length of stay were found.ConclusionsSubglottic secretion suction decreased VAP incidence and duration of mechanical ventilation and delayed VAP onset. However, subglottic secretion suction did not reduce mortality and length of ICU stay. Subglottic secretion suction is recommended for preventing VAP and for reducing ventilation length, especially in the population at high risk of early onset VAP.Trial RegistrationA protocol of this meta-analysis has been registered on PROSPERO (registration number: CRD42015015715 ); registered on 5 January 2015.

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