A European care bundle for prevention of ventilator-associated pneumonia.

Background: One recent approach to facilitating guideline implementation involves the use of care bundles.

Methods: This document presents a care bundle package addressing VAP prevention in an attempt to promote guideline-compliant practices. Uniquely, the development of these care bundles used a formalized methodology to assess the supporting data, based on multi-criteria decision analysis.

Results: The resulting VAP care bundles for prevention were: non-ventilatory circuit changes unless specifically indicated, alcohol hand hygiene, appropriately educated and trained staff, incorporation of sedation control and weaning protocols into patient care, and oral care with clorhexidine.

Conclusion: Adoption of these care bundles should rationalise VAP prevention practises and improve outcomes, such as length of stay.