02.07.20
14:15
Society
Awake Proning, High-flow nasal canna are the game changers in COVID treatment
Apollo Speciality Hospitals, Vanagaram was one of the first hospitals in Chennai to step up and peat COVID patients in the private sector. An exclusive fever clinic at the hospital has treated over more than thousand patients. Apollo Speciality Hospitals Vangaram has saved many lives with HFNC and Awake Droning eliminating the need for ventilation.
Many COVID patients are profoundly Hypoxemic with low oxygen saturation a condition called / Happy Hypoxia". They will be completely normal and comfortable with no breathing difficulty, however, their oxygen level will be deteriorating at a faster pace. This can be picked up only by pulse oximeter. These patients really do well with oxygen supplementation alone. With progression of the disease some of these patients with "Silent Hypoxia" become more hypoxic in spite of oxygen supplementation.
This is where we have seen the tesults of 'Awake Proning". In any patient requiring mote than 4 litres oxygen an awake proning protocol is employed. This simple non-invasive technique can eliminate the need for ventilation in some Covid-19 patients. 'Awake Proning" is basically having patients turn over onto their stomach or onto their side while lying down.
This method has been remarkably ef-fective in boasting the "Blood Oxygen Satura-tion" levels in the covid patients who have silent Hypoxia. Based on observation at Apollo Hospitals Vana-garam, the Jesuits are so encouraging in people with both silent Hypoxia and severe Hypoxia said Dr. Ebenezer, Senior Consultant and ICU Incharge "When the patients lie on the back, the fluid in the lung in Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome accumulates in the bottom of the lung, the heart and other abdominal contents further compress the lung region leading to nonuniform ventilation.
When pinning is done the patient's body is parallel to the ground, this flipping over will give more room to the lungs without any compression. Awake Pinning eliminates the need for intubation and ventilatory support in some patients "He also added, "Some patients with a severe disease become progressively hypoxic at the same time breathless requiring some form of support and assistance for which we use a High Flow Nasal Cannula or a non-invasive ventilator. In these patients also we employ awake proning to help us tide over the crisis and offset the hypoxemia."
TV BRICS reports with reference to Trinity Mirror.