For many years, intensive care has focused on avoiding immediate death from acute, life-threatening conditions. However, there are increasing reports of a number of lingering consequences for those who do indeed survive intensive care. Examples include on-going high risk of death, neurocognitive defects, significant caregiver burden, and continued high healthcare costs. Surviving Intensive Care, written by the world's experts in this area, is dedicated to better understanding the consequences of surviving intensive care and is intended to provide a synopsis of the current knowledge and a stimulus for future research and improved care of the critically ill.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of improving critical care survivorship. Comprised of four sections, the text presents interventions that can be used to improve patient outcomes and reduce the burden of post-intensive care syndrome across the arc of care, from the ICU to returning home. The first section of the text focuses on preventing adverse outcomes in the ICU, with an emphasis on implementing early mobilization, engaging and supporting families, and employing various forms of therapy. The second section revolves around enhancing recovery post-ICU, focusing on physical and neurocognitive rehabilitation programs, peer support, and poly-pharmacy management. Community reintegration is the subject of the third section, with emphasis on socioeconomic reintegration, healthcare utilization, and volunteerism in ICU recovery. The book concludes with a section on future considerations, specifically spotlighting preliminary ideas that address long-term sequelae and international collaboration to solve critical care challenges. Written by experts in the field, Improving Critical Care Survivorship: A Guide for Prevention, Recovery, and Reintegration is a valuable resource for critical care clinicians and researchers interested in improving the quality of patient survival after ICU admission.

ICU events are not uncommon but knowing what to do when a loved one is placed there is. This work explores the ICU with an eye toward guiding families to getting the best care for their beloved patient Intensive care will touch almost all of us at some point – whether directly, or through our families and or friends. This book is for every family of patients in the ICU, who have suddenly entered an intimidating and alien world, in which they feel powerless and out of control. In simple, direct language, Lara Goitein, MD, gives clear explanations of all aspects of intensive care – what all those lines and tubes are; common conditions such as sepsis and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS); physical changes in patients and what they mean; common procedures and their risks and benefits; and the people and the culture of the ICU. One full section of the book is devoted to Covid-19-specific issues. In addition, the book provides concrete advice for how family members can be effective advocates on behalf of their loved ones –what to know before giving consent for procedures, how to interact with ICU staff, how to help the ICU team guard against common complications of ICU care, and how to approach important decisions about end-of-life care. Along the way, the author gently reminds of us of what, in the end, matters most in the ICU. For readers who may be distracted and exhausted, this is a clear, accessible guide with concrete recommendations for getting the best care and asking the right questions along the way. A compassionate resource in a time of extreme stress, this book offers support to anyone touched by an ICU stay.

Surviving critical illness is not always the happy ending we imagine for patients. Many ICU survivors suffer from a range of long-lasting physical and psychological issues such end stage renal disease, congestive heart failure, cognitive impairment, neuromuscular weakness, and depression or anxiety, which affect their overall quality of life and ability to lead productive lives. This lingering burden or 'legacy' of critical illness is now recognized as a major public health issue, with major efforts underway to understand how it can be prevented, mitigated, or treated. The Textbook of Post-ICU Medicine: The Legacy of Critical Care discusses the science of the recovery process and the innovative treatment regimens which are helping ICU survivors regain function as they heal following trauma or disease. Describing the major clinical syndromes affecting ICU survivors, the book delineates established or postulated biological mechanisms of the post-acute recovery process, and discusses strategies for treatment and rehabilitation to promote recovery in the ICU and in the long term. The chapters are written by an interdisciplinary panel of leading clinicians and researchers working in the field. The book serves as a unique reference for general practitioners, internists and nurses caring for long term ICU survivors as well as specialists in intensive care medicine, neurology, psychiatry, and rehabilitation medicine.

Have you started an RN role in the ICU setting and are struggling to remember why you started? Maybe you have been doing this for a while and are feeling burned-out, are close to, or just want to know what to do to prevent it. This tool kit is for you. Operating in the critical care nursing role can be full of excitement and wonder, with its fair share of frustration and hurt. There are so many achievements to attain, many complex situations to encounter, and opportunities to grow and learn. This book is a useful tool kit that can be adapted in any ICU setting, serving as a guide with survival tactics that are simple and have been used in real-world ICU environments. It is not easy to stay afloat or even just survive in the ICU, especially within the chaos of what the world is facing right now as many encounter complex diagnoses and suffer from illnesses not foreseen before now. From wherever you are sitting today, take a moment to reflect on what makes you a nurse, a great nurse, and think of what it has taken for you to get to this moment. This tool kit will equip you to maintain momentum in your journey and be the best you have been made to be. We are all in this together and, take it from a fellow CVICU nurse, it takes heart to stay in the game and keep doing what we have been created to do. Let these words impart strength, joy, grace, and encouragement for your journey to stay the course and also give yourself room to breathe and recover as you keep going.

A world-renowned critical-care doctor offers hope for patients, their families, and the future of medicine in this timely, urgent, and compassionate work about the devastating and little-known physical and emotional effects of ICU stays. As COVID-19 survivors are discharged from hospitals, grateful to be alive, most don’t realise that the hardest part of their battle may be about to begin. Many will return home and struggle with long-term physical, mental, and emotional problems either caused or exacerbated by the life-saving treatment they received in intensive care. They’ll join the ranks of critical-care survivors whose lives are completely upturned by a hospital stay. More than half of the patients admitted to ICUs will struggle with post-intensive care syndrome, which can include Alzheimer’s-like cognitive deficits, PTSD, muscle and nerve damage, and depression. Their personal and professional lives can suffer irreparably. Worst of all, no one seems to understand that they have an illness at all. Not even their doctors. Dr Ely is now a leader in the field of ICU survivorship — advocating for compassionate care in the technology-driven enclave of the modern ICU — especially relevant during the coronavirus pandemic. In Every Deep-Drawn Breath, Dr Ely sounds a warning for the millions of people who will be admitted to ICUs in coming years and a wake-up call for healthcare professionals — himself included — to turn their gaze from the latest life-saving machines to really see, as he says, ‘the person in the patient’.