Assisted ventilation withdrawal in motor neuron disease: updated results.

IF 2 4区医学 Q3 HEALTH CARE SCIENCES & SERVICES

BMJ Supportive & Palliative Care Pub Date : 2025-03-24 DOI:10.1136/spcare-2025-005389

Lucy Bleazard, Jonathan Palmer, David Wenzel, Thomas Jeffery, Christina Faull

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Abstract

Introduction: Patients with ventilator-dependent motor neuron disease (MND) may request withdrawal of their assisted ventilation. Facilitating this process as a healthcare professional (HCP) can be emotionally and practically challenging. The Association for Palliative Medicine (APM) issued guidance to support HCPs and invited anonymised accounts of the withdrawal process to provide an update on the guidance.

Methods: HCPs submitted anonymised accounts via email. Quantitative data was analysed descriptively in Excel. Free-text comments were analysed thematically using an inductive, iterative approach.

Results: 68 HCPs submitted 95 accounts of ventilation withdrawal between 2015 and 2024. Most patients received medications pre-withdrawal (94%), primarily a combination of an opioid and midazolam, mostly subcutaneously. Younger patients tended to need higher doses to achieve adequate symptom management prior to withdrawal. Practices of weaning the ventilator varied significantly between respondents. The median time to death following withdrawal of ventilation was 30 min, with three-quarters of patients dying within 2 hours.

Conclusion: This is the largest data set to date regarding the withdrawal of assisted ventilation in MND. This updated analysis reaffirms that a personalised, titrated approach remains appropriate and effective. The revised APM Guidance 2025 incorporates new sections on recommendations for managing the ventilator.

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来源期刊

BMJ Supportive & Palliative Care Medicine-Medicine (miscellaneous)

CiteScore

4.60

自引率

7.40%

发文量

170

期刊介绍： Published quarterly in print and continuously online, BMJ Supportive & Palliative Care aims to connect many disciplines and specialties throughout the world by providing high quality, clinically relevant research, reviews, comment, information and news of international importance. We hold an inclusive view of supportive and palliative care research and we are able to call on expertise to critique the whole range of methodologies within the subject, including those working in transitional research, clinical trials, epidemiology, behavioural sciences, ethics and health service research. Articles with relevance to clinical practice and clinical service development will be considered for publication. In an international context, many different categories of clinician and healthcare workers do clinical work associated with palliative medicine, specialist or generalist palliative care, supportive care, psychosocial-oncology and end of life care. We wish to engage many specialties, not only those traditionally associated with supportive and palliative care. We hope to extend the readership to doctors, nurses, other healthcare workers and researchers in medical and surgical specialties, including but not limited to cardiology, gastroenterology, geriatrics, neurology, oncology, paediatrics, primary care, psychiatry, psychology, renal medicine, respiratory medicine.