Critical Care
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Flow Settings During High-Flow Nasal Cannula Oxygen Therapy
This article intends to examine the impact of flow settings in adult patients for various clinical conditions.
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New Ethical Guidance on End-of-Life Nutrition Therapy
The guidance is intended to help clinicians understand what medically assisted nutrition and hydration can and cannot accomplish for different groups of patients.
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Ethicists Can Resolve Conflicts Over Nutrition Therapy at End of Life
When deciding whether to administer, withhold, or withdraw end-of-life nutrition and hydration therapy, ethicists can help clinicians, patients, and families reach an equitable agreement.
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Ethicists’ Role if Clinicians Disregard Documented End-of-Life Wishes
Early involvement of the ethics team can be helpful. After an initial assessment, the healthcare team should arrange a family meeting with surrogates, clinicians, the ethics team, social workers, and other appropriate individuals (e.g., clergy). This should happen as soon as possible, no later than the following day. The ethics team should facilitate an honest and compassionate discussion about the plan to best honor the patient’s end-of-life decisions.
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Wrongful Prolongation of Life Suits Persist, Even When a Patient’s Status Was DNR
Regardless of training or good intentions to preserve life, at the end of the day, this is the patient's choice.
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Florida Hospital Tests Safety Bundle to Improve Alarm Management
With better communication and training, staff on a surgical ICU improved their responses to emergency alarms and alleviated alert fatigue.
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Aggressive End-of-Life Care Remains Common, Especially in Nursing Homes
Recent research findings raise ethical questions about how patient or family preferences are communicated to care providers, the timing of those discussions, and what policies are in place at the nursing home to honor patients’ goals of care.
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Do Race and Ethnicity Affect the Likelihood of ICU Admission?
Patients who identify with racial or ethnic minority groups who present with sepsis or acute respiratory failure are more likely to be admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) when compared to white patients. Capacity strain reduced the frequency of ICU admission but did not modify the differences seen between these groups.
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Does Surviving an ECMO Stay Put Patients at Greater Risk for Mental Health Problems?
Survivors of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) demonstrated a modest increase in risk of new mental health diagnoses after discharge vs. ICU survivors who do not undergo ECMO.
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‘Medical Clearance’ of Psychiatric Patient Can be Legally Risky
What does "medical clearance" really mean? Does it indicate a patient has no acute issues, or that all the patient’s chronic issues are stable? Or is it both? The answer depends on who you ask.