CCP Podcast 044: Helping The ITU Patient Sleep

Non-pharmacological interventions for sleep promotion in the intensive care unit

Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2015 Oct

It is well-known that patients in the intensive care units do suffer from a lack of sleep and frequent sleep disturbances.

This is a Cochrane review looking at the efficacy of nonpharmacological interventions for sleep promotion in the critically Ill adults in the intensive care units.

Perhaps one of the main results to come from this Cochrane review was the poor quality of the studies that they included. They initially included 30 trials, giving them a total of 1569 participants. However the quality was generally low or very low and as a consequence only three trials, those concerning earplugs or eye masks or both, provided data it suitable for two separate meta-analysis.

I would like in this podcast just to summarise some of the articles that they actually looked at when considering how to optimise the patient’s sleep in the intensive care unit and the various methods used.