Hello and welcome to the zero to finals podcast.

My name is Tom and in this episode I'm going to be talking to you about the intensive care unit.

And you can find written notes on this topic at zero to finals.com slash ICU

or in the anesthetics and ICU section of the zero definals surgery book.

So let's get straight into it. The high dependency unit or HDU and the intensive care unit,

ICU, are specialized hospital wards that manage severely unwell patients. In general, level 1 patients are

managed on a general acute ward, level 2 patients are managed on the high dependency unit or

HDU, and level 3 patients are managed on the intensive care unit or ICU, which is the highest level of support.

ICUs are run by intensive care specialists and specialist intensive care nurses.

Each nurse only cares for one or two patients at a time.

Patients admitted to the unit usually have some form of organ failure

requiring organ support and intensive monitoring.

Common reasons that patients are admitted to the intensive care unit

are following major surgery, for example an aortic aneurysm repair,

severe sepsis, major trauma, following cardiopulmonary resuscitation or CPR,

and for organ failure, for example, acute respiratory, renal or liver failure.

In the intensive care unit, patients can have advanced organ support,

and this includes respiratory support, cardiovascular support, renal support, nutritional support,

neurological support, dermatological support, and liver support.

Let's talk about admission.

Whether to admit someone to the intensive care unit is the decision of the intensive care specialist.

The capacity of intensive care units is often low, and the impact of intensive therapy on

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