Patients
This prospective interventional study was conducted between January 3, 2020, and September 30, 2021, in the intensive care unit of two tertiary hospitals (Bicêtre and Pitié-Salpêtrière hospitals, Paris, France). Our study was approved by the Comité de Protection des Personnes Est-III (2018-A01599-46) and registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT 04,023,786). It was conducted according to the STARD guidelines [Written informed consent was obtained from all patients, their next of kin or another surrogate decision maker, as appropriate. If patients or surrogate decision maker could not provide informed consent, post-hoc consent was obtained from patients who survived.
We included patients ≥ 18 years old, on invasive mechanical ventilation without spontaneous breathing, with PEEP ≥ 10 cmH