Design, Settings and Participants

We enrolled patients according to the order of the discharge date and analyzed patient records. The inclusion criteria were as follows: patients who were bedridden, received oral care and were admitted to Hachinohe National Hospital to receive rehabilitation and nursing care for two years or longer after being treated for an acute disease or after receiving mechanical ventilation between October 2001 and September 2016.

All patients underwent suctioning of nasopharyngeal secretions, repositioning of the bed, changing of position for feeding, and changing of urinary catheters, as previously described (10). Hachinohe National Hospital Ethics Committee approved this retrospective study.