My dear friend is incubated and has been in the hospital for about two months.  He is awake and is trying to communicate but his hands will not work so he cannot write and he has tubes down his throat due to his lungs (pulmunary embolism X 2).   He wants to talk so badly that I feel that my visits stress him out.  Is it really okay to have a machine breathing for someone and a feeding tube in and have them be awake?  Should he be sedated?  His eyes tell me that he is extremely uncomfortable and needs mercy.  I feel like I need to help but dont know what I can do.  Any ideas?  Thank you in advance for any input.
Hi... It is absolutely fine for a patient to be intubated and have a rules tube while being awake. Initially patients will have a lot of discomfort who require sedation, but as the days progress they get adjusted. Patient on ventilator requires breaks from sedation and cant be continually sedated for various reasons such as assessment for progression of patient. So, patient can be sedated on ventilator intermittently if he is restless...