Table 3.

Benefits of adding DEX in different clinical settings.

Clinical scenario	Benefits of using DEX	References
Peri-procedural sedation	Effective sedation in diverse procedural scenarios. Diverse administration routes. Reduces sympathetic and stress response to surgery. Sparing effects of anesthetic agents Reduces postoperative delirium, shivering and pain	Dyck et al., 1993; Khan et al., 1999; Bhana et al., 2000; Dutta et al., 2000; Venn et al., 2002; Anttila et al., 2003; Petroz et al., 2006; Sun et al., 2008; Potts et al., 2009; Su et al., 2010; Lin et al., 2011; Iirola et al., 2011b; Schnabel et al., 2013a; Schnabel et al., 2013b; Piao and Wu, 2014; Cortinez et al., 2015; Hannivoort et al., 2015; Lewis et al., 2015; Liu et al., 2015; Mahmoud and Mason, 2015; Yoo et al., 2015; Zhang et al., 2015; Hoffman and Hamner, 2016; Scott-Warren and Sebastian, 2016; Su X. et al., 2016; Wiczling et al., 2016; Liu et al., 2017; Sottas, 2017; Weerink et al., 2017
ICU	Reduces ICU stays and duration of mechanical ventilation Sparing effects of benzodiazepines Delirium prevention	Bhana et al., 2000; Su X. et al., 2016; Chlan et al., 2017; Nunes et al., 2018; Flükiger et al., 2018
Invasive Mechanical Ventilation	Shorter Time to extubation and ICU stay. Decrease incidence of delirium	Fraser et al., 2013; Reade and Finfer, 2014; Su et al., 2016; Hayashida et al., 2016; Nunes et al., 2018
Non-invasive Ventilation	Sedation and analgesia without respiratory depression	Hilbert et al., 2015
Delirium	Reduces incidence of delirium in ICU and postoperative period	Mo and Zimmermann, 2013; Pasin et al., 2014; Mahmoud and Mason, 2015; Duan et al., 2018; Flükiger et al., 2018; Skrobik et al., 2018
Neurological Injury	Potential neuroprotection in young children. Potential neuroprotection in Ischemic brain injury	Ren et al., 2016; Alam et al., 2017; Sottas, 2017; Schomer et al., 2019
Sepsis	Anti-inflamatory effects in sepsis. Potential hemodynamic stability	Xiang et al., 2014; Morelli et al., 2019