Improving tracheostomy delivery for trauma and surgical critical care patients: timely trach initiative

Tracheostomy is recommended within 7 days of intubation for patients with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) or requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation. A quality improvement project aimed to decrease time to tracheostomy to ≤7 days after intubation for eligible patients requiring tracheostomy in the surgical intensive care unit (SICU).

From January 2017 to June 2018, approximately 85% of tracheostomies were performed >7 days after intubation. The tracheostomy was placed a median of 10 days after intubation (range: 1-57).

Quality improvement principles were applied at an American College of Surgeons-verified level I trauma centre to introduce and analyse interventions to improve tracheostomy timing. Using the electronic health record, we analysed changes in tracheostomy timing, hospital length of stay (LOS), ventilator-associated pneumonia and peristomal bleeding rates for three subgroups: patients with TBI, trauma patients and all SICU patients.

In July 2018, an educational roll-out for SICU residents and staff was launched to inform them of potential benefits of early tracheostomy and potential complications, which they should discuss when counselling patient decision-makers. In July 2019, an early tracheostomy workflow targeting patients with head injury was published in an institutional Trauma Guide app.

Median time from intubation to tracheostomy decreased for all patients from 14 days (range: 4-57) to 8 days (range: 1-32, p≤0.001), and median hospital LOS decreased from 38 days to 24 days (p<0.001, r=0.35). Median time to tracheostomy decreased significantly for trauma patients after publication of the algorithm (10 days (range: 3-21 days) to 6 days (range: 1-15 days), p=0.03). Among patients with TBI, family meetings were held earlier for patients who underwent early versus late tracheostomy (p=0.008).

We recommend regular educational meetings, enhanced by digitally published guidelines and strategic communication as effective ways to improve tracheostomy timing. These interventions standardised practice and may benefit other institutions.