Search Tag: elderly patients
Ageing Population
2020 14 Sep
T he process of ageing cannot be defined by a number. The World Health Organization classifies anyone over the age of 65 as elderly. However, it is important to understand that ageing is a complex process, and we must consider physiological and cognitive vulnerabilities when talking about ageing as they can make some elderly people more prone to... Read more
Challenges in the Management of Severe SARS-CoV2 Infection in Elderly Patients
2020 14 Sep
Elderly patients have damaging and serious complications when they acquire SARS-CoV2 infection. It is thus important to consider this particular age group for better management of COVID-19. The gradual reversal of the population pyramid that has developed in recent decades has resulted in older adults being mostly affected in a pandemic... Read more
What Intensivists Can Learn From Geriatric Medicine
2020 14 Sep
In this article we discuss mind, mobility, medications, multi-complexity, and what matters most. These are key domains from geriatric medicine that are relevant to the practice of intensive care medicine. The notion that advanced age is a sufficient reason to decline admission to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) is no longer widely accepted... Read more
Infographic
2020 14 Sep
Problems associated with ageing, complications of critical illness in the elderly patient, and an overview of the gaps in the treatment of critically ill older adults. Read more
Ageing Heart Cells Increase Susceptibility of Older Patients to Severe COVID-19
2020 20 Aug
Genes that play an important role in allowing SARS-CoV-2 to invade heart cells become more active with age, according to research published today in the Journal of Molecular and Cellular Cardiology . The findings could help explain why age is major risk factor for dying from COVID-19, with people over 70 years at greatest risk, and why the disease... Read more
Pessimism in providing critical care for elderly patients
2019 29 May
A recent study conducted in France investigated the association of age with long-term mortality after discharge from the ICU. Another subset of this discussion relates to the critically ill elderly patients who have higher mortality compared to younger patients as well as longer lengths of stay in the ICU prior to death. There has been a... Read more
LIVES 2017: Did routine admission of elderly patients reduce mortality?
2017 27 Sep
Among critically ill elderly patients in France, a programme to promote systematic intensive care unit (ICU) admission increased ICU use but did not reduce six-month mortality, according to results of the Intensive Care for Elderly-CUB-Réa 2 (ICE-CUB 2) trial published in JAMA to coincide with presentation at the 30th European Society of Intensive... Read more
ICU Admission for the Very Elderly: A Cost Analysis
2017 23 May
Considering the poor clinical outcomes, and that many intensive care unit (ICU) admissions may be undesired by very elderly patients (aged 80 or older), ICU costs in this population are substantial, according to a new study published in the journal Critical Care. "Our finding that a preference for comfort care predicted a lower cost independent of... Read more
Study: Four Predictors Indicate Mortality Risk in Elderly Patients
2016 20 Sep
Four risk factors comprise an easy-to-remember, objective, and practical Risk Scale that has been developed by a group of Canadian researchers to predict mortality risk at time of ICU admission in patients aged over 80. The researchers hope that following validation the Risk Scale can be used to inform decision-making in these patients, and thus close... Read more
Better Outcomes in Elderly but Care Integration Needed
2016 21 Mar
Better Outcomes in Elderly but Care Integration Needed A recent study published in the International Journal of Surgery focuses on challenges the National Health System (NHS) in England face when treating elderly patients in emergency care. Ageing increases the propensity to chronic disease that leads to challenging decision making in... Read more