Prone Position to Improve Oxygenation in COVID-19 Patients Outside Critical Care

Prone positioning is known to improve the PaO2/FiO2 ratio and reduce mortality in patients with ARDS managed in the critical care setting. Therefore, it is incorporated into regular clinical practice of managing patients with ARDS in critical care and is being used as such in the COVID-19 outbreak. Given that prone positioning is recommended by the Intensive Care Society in non-ventilated patients with COVID-19, there is an urgent need to better understand the physiological effects of prone positioning in such cases. Furthermore, the translation and applicability of such a low-cost non-invasive intervention in a wider group of patients with pneumonia not specific to covid-19 infection, is an important consideration that merits investigation. This single-centred observational study conducted at Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust aims to improve understanding of physiological effects of prone positioning in non-ventilated patients with COVID-19 and a control group of patients with non-COVID-19 related pneumonia. The study also aims to incorporate a small subset of patients, with an approximately even spread of COVID-19 and non-COVID cases, which allows for an additional exploratory descriptive report on prone positioning over a 24-hour period. This study proposes that prone positioning improves oxygenation in non-ventilated patients with pneumonia (COVID-19 related or not) requiring supplemental oxygen managed outside of the critical care setting.