Anaesthesia Pain Intensive Care And Emergency Medicine A P I C E

Basic research, progress in technology and informatics, and the success of clinical pharmacology are the fundamental bases of this interesting field of medicine. Nowadays, critical care medicine is no longer for experts only, but it is a field in which researchers and clinicians, nurses and technical staff work in an interdisciplinary way, each offering their own skills. The volume is divided in six sections, devoted to critical care key issues, to lung diseases, to trauma, to acid-base equilibrium, to perioperative medicine, and to obstetrics.

The interest of researchers, clinicians, practitioners and surgeons in critical care medicine is growing. Clinical pharmacology and new technologies now allow more appropriate therapies, and the commitment of all those involved in this field is of fundamental importance for reaching high interventional standards, in both the prevention and treatment of critical conditions, but also for satisfying the concept of cost-effectiveness in critical care. In this volume advances in critical care medicine are described, including the application of new technologies in the clinical setting, the full integration of computers and informatics, and the continual training of physicians and technicians.

This critical care medicine book substantially differs from others due to the range of peculiarities that characterize it. Since it deals with acute patients in critical conditions, this is, as it were, a 'borderline'book,in the sense that it is intended for those, who, in their activity, need a continuous and in-depth interdisciplinary approach to optimize the quality of the treatments offered to critically-ill patients. This book helps to have a better understanding of the current limits of human intervention and aims at supplying updated guidelines; in particular, it is intended for those who, although having to guarantee continuity and top-quality therapies, must decide when and why the collaboration with and intervention by experts is necessary.

The management of critically ill patients has,in the past few years, been a discipline at the forefront of development which continues to make progress with the support of basic and clinical research in the broadest sense. The application of biotechnology in this particular area has revealed itself to be essential in an attempt to provide the best interpretation of the bio-humoral and functional alterations present in a long series of often complex clinical conditions. The care of the critically ill is also at the forefront in the application of increasingly sophisticated clinical monitoring systems that also contribute to standardizing certain procedures, establish guidelines, and evaluate the efficacy of therapeutic interventions and their costs.

At the APICE '96 research scientists and clinicians were provided with updated guidelines for the treatment of patients with acute and chronic critical conditions. This volume contains 100 chapters,in which the main pathophysiological concepts were reviewed, with special emphasis on the cardiovascular, respiratory, metabolic, and neurologic systems. Special reference is made to the pharmacologic and biotechnologic strategies currently being used to support those vital functions that are affected by severe and sometimes devastating diseases. The topics of infection, sepsis,and SIRS have been reviewed and updated in keeping with the most recent information available, and particular focus has been directed to ethics.

Continuous update in critical care medicine is a real challenge due to the growing dimensions of its contents; these elements are the result of new research acquisitions, and of those clinical situations where the physician is able to intervene at a given moment, with the use of effective prevention techniques. They are also the result of new technologies able to define complex sub-clinical diagnostic aspects; lastly, they are the result of effective therapeutic techniques available, and of treatment strategies able to influence radically and positively the patient's clinical course. Critical care medicine is playing a key role in the most advanced environments, as it represents a cross-sectional field of action, involving several specialties, such as anaesthesiology, general medicine, surgery, paediatrics.

The management of the critically ill patients has been in the past few years a discipline at the forefront of development which continues to make progress with the support of basic and clinical research. This work is a collection of material that deals with the management of critically ill patients, published on the occasion of the 13th APICE congress in November 1998, which celebrated 40 years of Critical Care Medicine.

The end of the second millenium is distinguished for the increasing interest in the field of critical care medicine, not only among physicians and clinical scientists but also on the part of the mass media. This is an interdisciplinary area of medicine drawing upon the specialties of anesthesiology, internal medicine and surgery, and relying upon the essential contributions and support from basic research. Advances in critical care medicine depend on the application of new technologies to the clinic, the full integration of computers and informatics, the continual training of physicians and technicians, and the consideration of ethical issues in the clinical setting. Within this complex panorama of complementary approaches and viewpoints, it is apparent that critical care medicine is one of the best examples of evidence-based medicine.