Evaluating the Effect of Mouth Washing with Chlorhexidine on the Ventilator Associated Pneumonia

One of the most important hospital infections which lead to more mortality، duration of hospitalization، and health care costs is ventilator-associated pneumonia. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of 12% chlorhexidine mouthwash on the frequency of ventilator-associated pneumonia in patients hospitalized in ICU. Material & Methodos: It was a clinical trial which was done on 130 patients under ventilation and hospitalized in ICU. The study was conducted during a nine-month period from May 2011 to January 2012 in one of the medical teaching hospitals affiliated with Tehran University of Medical Sciences. The sample was first selected by convenience sampling and then was assigned to either experimental or control group by minimization. The experimental and control group received 12% chlorhexidine and serum soluble salt mouthwash three times per day respectively. Pneumonia clinical version was used to diagnose pneumonia. Data was analyzed by Chi-square tests، Fisher exact test، and T test using SPSS-PC (v. 16).

Findings showed that the frequency of pneumonia was 23/1% in total which 18/5% was observed in experimental group and 27/7% in control group. Chi-square test showed that there was no significant difference between experimental and control groups (p > 0/05). The most common bacteria isolated from the patients were Acinetobacter baumannii، Pseudomonas aeruginosa، Kelebsiella and Ecoli respectively.

Frequency of pneumonia was not significantly different between the patients who received mouth wash with 12% chlorhexidine and those with saline. There was also no difference between the isolated bacteria from the two groups. Therefore، further studies with higher concentrations of chlorhexidine are needed.