Changing clinical guidelines from delayed to early aperient administration for enterally fed intensive care patients was associated with increased diarrhoea: A before-and-after, intention-to-treat evaluation

摘要

Background: The 14-bed intensive care unit of a tertiary referral hospital adopted a guideline to start docusate sodium with sennosides when enteral nutrition was started. This replaced a guideline to start aperients after 24 h of enteral nutrition if no bowel action had occurred. We sought to determine the effect of this change on the incidence of diarrhoea and constipation in intensive care.