Tag: ICU
One of the Deadliest Hospital-Acquired Infections Is Preventable
Johns Hopkins Study Shows One of the Deadliest Hospital-Acquired Infections Is Preventable. For some hospital patients, going on a ventilator is often the difference between life and death. About 800,000 hospital patients... read more
Antifungal Treatment in the ICU
Invasive fungal infections (IFIs) are a major cause of morbidity and mortality in critically ill patients. Almost 80% of IFIs are due to Candida spp., which are the third most common isolated microorganisms in the intensive... read more
Critical Care Pharmacotherapeutics
Critical Care Pharmacotherapeutics presents information on the fundamentals of critical care practice from a pharmacist's point of view. This accessible text is an excellent introduction to critical care pharmacy. Pharmacy... read more
Enough is Enough (O2 Saturation of 94-96%)
The liberal use of supplemental oxygen therapy in acutely ill adults has a long history in the hospital, but high-quality therapy supporting its practice is unclear. Recently, the role of oxygen therapy in non-hypoxic patients... read more
Penn Medicine Shortens ICU Stays with Real-time Data
Leveraging real-time data streams from its EHR platform, Penn Medicine has created a dashboard and alerting system to speed the process of getting ICU patients breathing on their own. Many patients in hospital intensive care... read more
Hoopla Aside, hs-cTnI is Not Catching Missed Mis
We have been searching for a tool to identify myocardial infarction patients who are truly safe for discharge ever since Pope, et al., found that we were discharging two percent of patients with MIs from the emergency department.... read more
The Artificial Intelligence Clinician Learns Optimal Treatment Strategies for Sepsis in Intensive Care
Sepsis is the third leading cause of death worldwide and the main cause of mortality in hospitals but the best treatment strategy remains uncertain. In particular, evidence suggests that current practices in the administration... read more
Acute Right Heart Failure
The right ventricle is often overlooked in critical care in favour of the attention to the left side of the heart. But acute right heart failure is important and today on the podcast we discuss its implications for critical... read more
Optimizing Patient and Family Education Resources for the ICU
Offering stronger patient and family education tools in the ICU will ease patient and caregiver fears and make them more comfortable with the care setting. An integrated, centralized, and digital platform is best suited for... read more
The Psychological Impact of Intensive Care
A period in intensive care is known to negatively affect patients' long term physical, cognitive and psychiatric health, in what's known as post-intensive care syndrome (PICS). Researchers from the University of Oxford sought... read more
Humanizing the ICU
In the midst of trying to correct organ failures, clinicians may neglect to carefully consider what the patient is experiencing: to be on the brink of death, be unable to speak, be stripped naked, have strangers enter the... read more
Less or More Hemodynamic Monitoring in Critically Ill Patients
The use of echocardiography should be initially encouraged in patients with shock to identify the type of shock and to select the most appropriate therapy. The use of more invasive hemodynamic monitoring techniques should... read more
Nutrition Support for the Critically Ill
This text provides a review of the current knowledge in both the mechanics of nourishing the critically ill and the metabolic and immunological roles nutrients play. In-depth chapters discuss disease-related malnutrition... read more
Systematic Review of the Effects of ICU Noise on Sleep of Healthy Subjects and the Critically Ill
ICU patients exhibit disturbed sleeping patterns, often attributed to environmental noise, although the relative contribution of noise compared to other potentially disrupting factors is often debated. We therefore systematically... read more
Infectious Diseases in the Pediatric ICU
Infants and children are at high risk of acquiring infections and this is most critical on the pediatric intensive care unit, as these infections have serious effects on mortality. Infectious Diseases in the Pediatric Intensive... read more
A Framework for Increasing Trust Between Patients and the Organizations That Care for Them
Trust matters in health care. It makes patients feel less vulnerable, clinicians feel more effective, and reduces the imbalances of information by improving the flow of information. Trust is so fundamental to the patient-physician... read more
Poor Hospital Design Has an Impact on Staff, Patients, and Healthcare
Many hospitals in which I have worked have struggled with finances over the last 5 years. There has often been a ban on capital investment on new physical infrastructure projects even extended to repairs in some circumstances.... read more
Antibiotics for the Critically Ill Patient
We spend a lot of time obsessing over the finer details of critical care: which fluid is best? which vasopressor is best? will another liter of fluid help? These details are important, but for a septic patient something... read more
Sepsis Incidence and Mortality are Underestimated in Australian ICU Administrative Data
When compared with the reference standard — prospective clinical diagnosis — ANZICS CORE database criteria significantly underestimate the incidence of sepsis and overestimate the incidence of septic shock, and also result... read more
Benzodiazepine Use and Neuropsychiatric Outcomes in the ICU
The majority of included studies indicated that benzodiazepine use in the ICU is associated with delirium, symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression, and cognitive dysfunction. Future well-designed studies... read more
Corticosteroid Treatment in Critically Ill Patients with Severe Influenza Pneumonia
Administration of corticosteroids in patients with severe influenza pneumonia is associated with increased ICU mortality, and these agents should not be used as co‑adjuvant therapy. A total of 1846 patients with primary... read more
Assessment of the Safety of Discharging Select Patients Directly Home From the ICU
The discharge of select adult patients directly home from the ICU is common, and it is not associated with increased health care utilization or increased mortality. Among the 6732 patients included in the study, 2826 (42%)... read more
