LIBRARIES The author hereby grants to M.I.T. permission to reproduce and distribute publicly paper and electronic copies of this thesis and to grant others the right to0p so. Over the past 20 years, there has been a large ongoing effort in the Laboratory for Computational Physiology (LCP) to collect and annotate large databases of physiologic signals in order to facilitate an open initiative to...

UNLABELLED Nutritional support in the critically ill patient is an important mainstay within the specialty of intensive care medicine. Patients at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) are usually hypercatabolic and require an adequate nutritional support. Usually, the intensive care physician prescribes nutrition type, its amount, and follow-up of patients; however, the qualification of these physicia...

Objective: Examine values, preferences and goals elicited by doctors following goals-of-care (GOC) discussions with critically ill patients who had life-limiting illnesses. Design: Descriptive qualitative study using four-stage latent content analysis. Setting: Tertiary intensive care unit (ICU) in South Western Victoria. Participants: Adults illnesses were admitted to the ICU documented GOC, b...

OBJECTIVE To investigate analgesic prescription patterns and administration in postoperative cardiac surgery patients in the ICU in a tertiary hospital. METHOD The audit was registered with the institutional Quality Improvement Committee. A sample of 73 postcardiac surgery patients who were admitted to the ICU during a 12-month period in 2003-2004 were reviewed. RESULTS All patients receive...

background & aim : this study aimed to discover the lived experiences of patients transferred from the intensive care unit (icu) to a general ward, to reach a deeper understanding of this phenomenon. methods & materials: this is a qualitative study with an interpretative phenomenological approach, which is conducted at hospitals affiliated to universities, and private hospitals of tehran in 201...

BACKGROUND Preventable deaths due to errors in trauma patients with otherwise survivable injuries account for up to 10% of fatalities in Level I trauma centers, 50% of these errors occur in the intensive care unit (ICU). The root cause of 67% of the Joint Commission sentinel events is communication errors. The objective is (1) to study how critical information degrades and how it is lost over 2...

INTRODUCTION The aim of this study was to investigate current mobilization practice, strength at ICU discharge and functional recovery at 6 months among mechanically ventilated ICU patients. METHOD This was a prospective, multi-centre, cohort study conducted in twelve ICUs in Australia and New Zealand. Patients were previously functionally independent and expected to be ventilated for >48 hou...

Health care costs represent a large percentage of the gross domestic product all over the world. According to the National Health Statistics Group, health care expenditure in the United States accounted for as much as 14% of the gross national product in 1992 and it is projected to reach 30% by 2030. The intensive care unit (ICU) represents the hallmark of highly competent modern hospitals, off...

The Intensive Care Unit (ICU) is a place of technology, unusual drug formularies and rapid decisionmaking, all designed to help critically ill patients get better. However, these same factors can create an environment where a healthcare worker might systematically harm a patient without fear of detection or punishment. Such allegations are difficult to substantiate because evidence is so diffic...

Gastrointestinal (GI) complications occurring after cardiac surgery are considered as “second line” complications due to their scarcity. Cardiac surgeons, ICU staff and nursing personnel are usually aware and suspicious of cardiac-related mishappenings after heart surgery; however they often tend to underestimate potentially lethal manifestations involving the gastrointestinal track, or organs ...