ABSTRACT
Nosocomial pneumonia or hospital-acquired pneumonia (HAP) is defined as pneumonia that appears 48 hours or more after hospitalization. In this definition, it is assumed that the patient was not incubating the causative microorganism when admitted to the hospital. Patients with HAP may be managed in a ward or when the illness is severe in the intensive care unit (ICU). Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) refers to pneumonia that begins and develops after endotracheal intubation (1,2). However, a patient who has just undergone tracheotomy yet is not on a ventilator is similarly susceptible to VAP. Thus, a more appropriate term would be ‘‘endotracheal-tube-associated pneumonia.’’ In this chapter we have opted, nevertheless, to use the traditional term.
