Original ArticleA Randomized Controlled Trial of the Effect of Fixed-dose Routine Nocturnal Oxygen Supplementation on Oxygen Saturation in Patients with Acute Stroke
Section snippets
Trial Design, Setting, and Participants
This was a randomized, controlled, single-blind study comparing the effects of fixed-dose oxygen supplementation on nocturnal SpO2 with no oxygen. Adult patients with a clinical diagnosis of acute stroke14 who were not moribund were recruited within 72 hours of admission to our university hospital, a large teaching hospital admitting about 800 patients with stroke per year. Patients with an admission diagnosis of stroke or possible stroke were identified by a part time research nurse (S.S.),
Recruitment
In all, 214 successive patients within 72 hours of onset of a first acute stroke who were not moribund were identified from the admissions log and considered for trial inclusion (Figure 1). Of those, 151 (71%) were excluded for the following reasons: oxygen treatment in progress at the time of recruitment (n = 46); and no oxygen treatment in progress at the time of screening, but potential clinical indications for oxygen (n = 33) [e.g., chronic obstructive airways disease (n = 9), chest
Discussion
The results of this study show that oxygen supplementation at a rate of 2 L/min results in a mean increase in nocturnal SpO2 of 2.5%. Oxygen supplementation also reduces the number of desaturations.
Patients in either group spent very little time with SpO2 of less than 90%. This may be a result of the selection criteria, because patients who were hypoxic or had definite indications for oxygen supplementation at baseline were not included. Oxygen supplementation did not reduce the time spent with
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North Staffordshire Medical Institute funded the purchase of the pulse oximeters.