ICU Management & Practice, ICU Volume 15 - Issue 1 - 2015

A warm welcome to Brussels for the 35thInternational Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine. In 1980 we welcomed just a few hundred delegates to Brussels - pre-mobile phones and pre-Internet! While networking has become even easier with mobile and online technology, nothing beats meeting our colleagues in person. This year more than 6,300 participants will convene for ISICEM. Allow us a little nostalgia as we look back over the years. In this issue we asked Symposium stalwarts for their memories of ISICEM.

 

Our cover story this issue is “The Lung.” In their review of nosocomial pneumonia Leonel Lagunes and Jordi Rello discuss some of the key advances from the 2005 ATS/IDSA guidelines publication and emphasise future research for unsolved issues. Next, Alexandre Demoule explains when and why noninvasive ventilation should be used in mild ARDs, but stresses that as a therapeutic option it awaits confirmation in prospective clinical trials. Peter Thomas and Jeffrey Lipman outline the role of physiotherapists as key members of the Australian ICU multidisciplinary team, providing respiratory management, exercise and mobilisation. Finally, Jean-Louis Teboul and Xavier Monnet address the therapeutic dilemmas of fluid management in ARDS. Fluid administration in case of ARDS is a real therapeutic challenge since there are risks of worsening of pulmonary oedema even in preload responsive patients. Assessment of the benefit/ risk ratio in each individual patient is of utmost importance, they argue.

 

Our Series this year is Infections. We start with an article by Christopher Lockie and Duncan Wyncoll on infection prevention. They focus on four simple, evidence-based, cost-effective interventions to combat healthcare-associated infection, which are not yet widely implemented in clinical practice.

 

The Matrix section opens with Jean-Charles Preiser discussing water intake in the ICU patient, in particular the challenge of correcting hydration status while avoiding an increase in extracellular volume (interstitial and intravascular), including infusions via the enteral route. Next, Thomas Berlet argues that it is time to rationalise standard laboratory measurements in the ICU. He describes an approach to developing and implementing the use of rationalised laboratory measurements.

 

Our Management section is devoted to social media. Three renowned Spanish medical bloggers take us through getting started with a health blog, and we also interview Gabriel Heras La Calle about his “Humanizing Intensive Care” blog. Adrian Wong and Steve Mathieu outline how to get started with Twitter and how to use it as a convenient, online record of continuing medical education.

 

Julia Wendon, the liver intensive care specialist, is our Interviewee this issue. She discusses the advances and challenges in liver intensive care as well as the setup of the Liver Intensive Care Unit at Kings College Hospital London.

 

We visit Israel for our Country Focus. Julie Benbenishty writes about the Israeli Society of Cardiac and Intensive Care Nursing, which is actively engaging in research and best practice to improve intensive care in Israel.

 

As always, if you would like to get in touch, please email [email protected]