Oxygen Therapy in Acute Care Medicine service with a critical patient in the ICU. Oxygen therapy is a commonly used strategy in modern medicine. In most situations with declining oxygen saturations, clinicians are quick to use this technique. While effective in the setting of hypoxia, there are, however, some circumstances in which excess oxygen is indiscriminately administered for extended periods. In healthcare, there has been a significant shift from the conce...

ARTICLES| VOLUME 8, ISSUE 3, P258-266, MARCH 01, 2020 Sepsis-associated acute respiratory distress syndrome in individuals of European ancestry: a genome-wide association study Beatriz Guillen-Guio, Jose M Lorenzo-Salazar, Shwu-Fan Ma, et al Lancet 2020; 8: 258-266 Summary Background Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a lung inflammatory process caused mainly by sepsis. Most previous studies that identified genetic risks for ARD...

Can the Ultrasound Probe Replace the Stethoscope? Multi-frequency medical device for ultrasound scanner Auscultation is used in most routine examinations of critically ill patients and is considered to be one of the essential components of the clinical examination. Two of the most frequent pathologies encountered in critically ill patients are pulmonary oedema and pneumonia. Both of these conditions often coexist.  In recent years, many clinicians have started to...

ORIGINAL ARTICLE Nonsedation or Light Sedation in Critically Ill, Mechanically Ventilated Patients Hanne T. Olsen, Helene K. Nedergaard, Thomas Strøm, et al Abstract BACKGROUND In critically ill, mechanically ventilated patients, daily interruption of sedation has been shown to reduce the time on ventilation and the length of stay in the intensive care unit (ICU). Data on whether a plan of no sedation, as compared with a plan of light sedation, has an effec...

VITAMINS Trial: No Significant Benefit of Vitamin C Cocktail Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that causes nearly one-third to half of all hospital deaths. It is also responsible for more than 5 million deaths worldwide each year. Patients with septic shock are an important subgroup of sepsis. These patients have circulatory and metabolic abnormalities that further increase their mortality risk. New treatments could potentially improve outcomes for such p...

ARTICLES|ONLINE FIRST Sepsis-associated acute respiratory distress syndrome in individuals of European ancestry: a genome-wide association study Beatriz Guillen-Guio, Jose M Lorenzo-Salazar, Shwu-Fan Ma, et al Lancet Respir Med Published:January 23, 2020 DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S2213-2600(19)30368-6 Summary Background Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a lung inflammatory process caused mainly by sepsis. Most previous studies that identifi...

PEPTIC Trial: Preventing Stress Ulcers in ICU Patients Medicines in the ICU. Medicinal lines next to the bed of the patient Approximately 2.5% of adults acutely admitted to an ICU develop upper gastrointestinal bleeding. 70% of these patients are prescribed stress ulcer prophylaxis. Proton pump inhibitors are the most commonly prescribed drugs as they reduce bleeding risk. However, there are some clinicians who prescribe histamine-2 receptor blockers. But this pract...

Editorial February 16, 2020 Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment and Limiting Overtreatment at the End of Life Robert D. Truog, Terri R. Fried JAMA. Published online February 16, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2019.22522 In this issue of JAMA, Lee and colleagues1 examine the association between Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST), which involve portable medical orders that document treatment limitations for out-of-...

ICU Management & Practice, Volume 18 - Issue 2, 2018 Is pre-hospital coagulation management in trauma feasible? Coagulation management remains a formidable challenge in severely bleeding trauma patients. A strong rationale suggests starting treatment of trauma-induced coagulopathy in the pre-hospital phase. The burden of trauma is increasing worldwide, particularly in less well-resourced nations. There are an estimated 5 million deaths per year, more tha...

Original Investigation Caring for the Critically Ill PatientFebruary 16, 2020 Association of Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment With ICU Admission Among Patients Hospitalized Near the End of Life Robert Y. Lee, Lyndia C. Brumback, Seelwan Sathitratanacheewin, et al JAMA. Published online February 16, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2019.22523 Abstract Importance Patients with chronic illness frequently use Physician Orders for Life-Sust...