An Introductory handbook of intensive and critical care medicine for clinical staff new to the exciting world of critical care medicine. The primary purposes are education and guidance for medical and nursing staff who have limited experience in the specialty of critical care medicine.
IC@N is based on a problem-oriented and practical bedside approach. It assumes some medical knowledge, basic clinical experience, and above all common sense. It provides useful advice about important aspects of critical care medicine and trouble-shooting of common problems in critically-ill patients but it is not intended to be an exhaustive or comprehensive textbook.
These guidelines are evidence-based and practical and by necessity specific - some will say too specific.
The guidelines in IC@N have been developed, trialled, and revised over several years by the medical and nursing staff at The Northern Hospital (Melbourne, Australia). They are guidelines, nothing more.
Our motto is: soins intensifs sans frontieres (critical care without borders). The knowledge and skills of critical care are not limited by geography or speciality or experience. They can be learned by all and ported to other areas of acute health care with the intention of preventing and treating serious illness before it becomes irreversible.
The main areas covered are:
1. Being part of the ICU Ward Round: examining patients, communicating, simple guidelines for routine care.
2. Responding to medical emergencies: cardiac arrest, major trauma, ward medical emergencies, various acute problems in complex ICU patients.
3. Responding to common ICU problems such as fever, hypotension, hypoxia, hypercapnia, hypokalaemia, delirium.
4. Responding to complications arising from mechanical ventilation, tracheostomy, nutrition, procedures.
5. Introduction to ICU monitoring and common laboratory tests and how to interpret 'the numbers'.
6. Assessment of risk, prognosis, perioperative management of surgical ICU patients.
7. Understanding fluid therapy, assessment and treatment.