Noninvasive and invasive ventilation in acute respiratory failure associated with bronchiectasis.

Purpose: To describe the outcomes of patients with bronchiectasis and acute respiratory failure (ARF) treated with noninvasive ventilation (NIV) and invasive mechanical ventilation (IMV) after a failure of conservative measures, and to identify the predictors of hospital mortality and NIV failure.

Methods: Retrospective review of bronchiectatic patients on NIV (n = 31) or IMV (n = 26) for ARF over 8 years in a medical intensive care unit (ICU) experienced in NIV.

Results: At baseline, the NIV group had more patients with acute exacerbations without identified precipitating factors (87.