ABSTRACT

Every patient admitted to intensive care unit passes through a period in which intensive care requires obligatory bed rest. This leads to a longer duration of mechanical ventilation, intensive care and hospital stay, development of venous thromboembolism and increased mortality. Early mobilization is thought to reduce intensive care unit stay and mortality in intensive care patients, increasing oxygen transport and leading to fewer pulmonary complications. In our study, it was aimed to investigate the effect of in-bed and out-of-bed early mobilization on intensive care patient hemodynamics.

In this study, 72 patients from 324 patients who were followed up between October 2014 and March 2015 at Hacettepe University Anesthesiology Intensive Care Unit 1 and 2 were mobilized in bed or out of bed within the first 24 hours of their stay. Heart rate, mean arterial pressure, respiratory rate and arterial oxygen saturation (SaO2) values were recorded in right and left lateral position and step by step in sitting and out of bed mobility.

Of the 72 patients included 41% were male and 59% were female. The mean age was 53±19 years. 70% were postoperative period. Twenty-seven patients (37%) were mobilized in bed while 45 patients (63%) were mobilized out of bed within 24 hour of ICU admission. We found a statistically significant but clinically insignificant increase at heart rate and mean arterial pressure (p<0.05) when compared to the supine position data in-bed mobility, We found statistically significant increase in respiratory rate during sitting and standing beside the bed when compared to the supine position in out-ofbed position (p<0.05). We did not find any significant differences between the groups.

We concluded that, early mobilization of intensive care patients in the first 24 hours of hospitalization is both safe and practicable.

Keywords: Early mobilization, critical illness, hemodynamics