Prevention and Treatment of Early Postoperative Atelectasis Using The MetaNeb System in Patients Underwent Esophagectomy

The goal of this clinical trial is to evaluate whether the MetaNeb® System can effectively prevent and treat early postoperative atelectasis in adult patients admitted to ICU after esophagectomy for esophageal cancer. The main question it aims to answer is: can the MetaNeb® system significantly reduce the lung ultrasound score (LUSS) indicating atelectasis on postoperative days 1 and 2? Participants will be randomly assigned to either the standard treatment or MetaNeb group, undergo lung ultrasound and electrical impedance tomography (EIT) assessments on postoperative days 1 and 2, receive at least 4 sessions of MetaNeb therapy on postoperative day 1 if in the intervention group, be monitored for oxygenation indices, ICU stay duration, incidence of mechanical ventilation, need for bronchoscopic intervention, and adverse events like pneumothorax.

NCT Number	NCT07284056
Lead Sponsor	Shanghai Zhongshan Hospital
Conditions	Atelectases, Postoperative Pulmonary
Enrollment	178 participants
Start Date	2026-01-01
Primary Completion	2026-04-30 (estimated)
Study Completion	2026-12-31 (estimated)
Updated on ClinicalTrials.gov	2025-12-16