Figure 1.

Proportion of patients at a given status from admission until 28 days (A), stratified according to the absence (B) or presence (C) of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). There are 4 possible status (on mechanical ventilation: MV[+]; not on MV but still in the intensive care unit [ICU]: MV[−]; and discharged alive from the ICU or dead) subsequently divided according to the presence or absence of ventilator-associated lower respiratory tract infection (VA-LRTI) in the patient (LRTI [+] or LRTI[−], respectively). Note the slightly higher mortality for patients having ARDS without (green) or with (red) previous VA-LRTI. There was a smaller proportion of patients discharged after VA-LRTI in the ARDS subgroup (cyan bars).