Stories Category: Intensive Care
Shock Trauma to Study Body Cooling for Patients in Cardiac Arrest from Massive Bleeding
The R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center at the University of Maryland has opened a clinical trial to study whether rapidly cooling the body temperature of patients whose hearts stop due to massive blood loss will give surgeons... read more
Frequency of pulmonary embolism amongst patients admitted for first-time syncope
All patients admitted to an inpatient service for first-time syncope from the emergency departments of 11 Italian hospitals from 2012-2014 were evaluated for pulmonary embolism. Pulmonary embolism was found in 17.3% of patients... read more
Animal-assisted Activity in the ICU
Animals are being introduced into hospital settings in ever-increasing numbers. Emerging literature suggests that incorporating trained animals to assist with medical care and rehabilitation therapies can promote patient... read more
An Expert Consensus Statement on Physical Rehabilitation After Hospital Discharge
A consensus-based framework for optimal physical therapy (PT) after hospital discharge is proposed. Future research should focus on feasibility testing of this framework, developing risk stratification tools and validating... read more
PAH Associated With Systemic Lupus Erythematosus
Patients with SLE-PAH have an overall 5-year survival rate of 83.9% after the Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension (PAH) diagnosis. Anti-SSA/SSB antibodies may be a risk factor for PAH, and the presence of anti-U1-RNP antibodies... read more
A Measure of Physicians’ Motivation to Adopt Medical Devices
This is the first reliable and valid scale to measure physicians' adoption motivation. Future adoption studies assessing the individual level should include the PMA scale to obtain more information about the role of physicians’... read more
Assessing Usefulness of Randomized Clinical Trials
In the pyramid of evidence based medicine randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are considered to be one of the most reliable study designs when evaluating the cause and effect of treatment modalities. When evaluating randomized... read more
Furosemide in the Treatment of Acute Pulmonary Edema
CHF is a common problem in the US with over 5 million patients carrying the diagnosis and 500,000 new diagnoses each year.1 Cardiogenic acute pulmonary edema (APE) occurs when blood backs up into the pulmonary vasculature... read more
Medical Misdiagnosis: More Common Than You Think
Each year an estimated 12 million Americans get the wrong diagnosis from their doctor--a medical problem is seen as something else, missed entirely or identified late. Most of the diagnostic errors are not about rare diseases,... read more
Is assembly line surgery better for the patient?
A friend of mine recently underwent a total knee replacement. Although he did well and was pain-free, he did say that he felt he was on an assembly line. I asked him what he meant. As he was talking, I flashed back 30 years,... read more
Long-term outcomes in patients with septic shock transfused at a lower versus a higher haemoglobin threshold
Long-term mortality rates and HRQoL did not differ in patients with septic shock and anaemia who were transfused at a haemoglobin threshold of 7 g/dl versus a threshold of 9 g/dl. We may reject a more than 3 % increased hazard... read more
Core Outcome Measures for Clinical Research in ARF Survivors
This Core Outcome Measurement Set is recommended for use in all clinical research evaluating acute respiratory failure (ARF) survivors after hospital discharge. In the future, researchers should evaluate measures for outcomes... read more
Calcium induces chronic lung infections
Researchers have now discovered that calcium induces the switch from acute to chronic infection. One of the most serious pathogens is the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which frequently causes hospital infections and is... read more
Catheter ablation lowers long-term risk of recurrent stroke in atrial fibrillation patients
Atrial fibrillation patients with a prior history of stroke who undergo catheter ablation to treat the abnormal heart rhythm lower their long-term risk of a recurrent stroke by 50 percent. The Intermountain study compared... read more
Focus on Ventilation and Airway Management in the ICU
Airway and ventilation management are particularly challenging in the intensive care unit (ICU), and are associated with high morbidity and mortality. Figure summarizes some of the more recent findings from the literature.... read more
Endobronchial Ultrasound Can ID Pulmonary Thromboembolism
The researchers found that in four cases (0.7 percent), filling defects were demonstrated in central pulmonary arteries while sampling mediastinal lymph nodes.... read more
New-Onset Atrial Fibrillation in the Critically Ill
Kyle Enfield, MD, speaks with Travis J. Moss, MD, MSc, and J. Randall Moorman, MD, about the article, "New-Onset Atrial Fibrillation in the Critically Ill," published in the May 2017 issue of Critical Care Medicine. Drs.... read more
