A Randomised Trial of High-flow Nasal Cannula in Infants with Moderate Bronchiolitis

erj.ersjournals.com August 14, 2020

In patients with moderate bronchiolitis, there was no evidence of lower rate of escalating respiratory support among those receiving HFNC therapy.

The analyses included 268 patients among the 2621 infants assessed for inclusion during two consecutive seasons in 17 French pediatric emergency departments.

The percentage of infants in treatment failure was 14% (19 out of 133) in the study group, compared to 20% (27 out of 135) in the control group.

HFNC did not reduce the risk of admission to PICU (21 (15%) out of 133 in the study group versus 26 (19%) out of 135 in the control group).

In this randomised controlled trial, we assigned infants aged <6 months who had moderate bronchiolitis to receive either HFNC at 3 L·kg−1·min−1 or standard oxygen therapy.