SCCM Podcast

Martha Curley, RN, PhD, discusses her article in the Mar 2006 issue of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, titled "State Behavioral Scale: A Sedation Assessment Instrument for Infants and Young Children Supported on Mechanical Ventilation." Dr. Curley, director of nursing research in critical care and cardiovascular nursing research at The Children's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, is a recognized expert in pediatric critical care nursing. She discusses the development and validation of the State Behavioral Scale, a tool used in the evaluation of the level of sedation in pediatric patients requiring mechanical ventilation. (Pediatric Care Medicine, Volume 7, Number 2 Mar 2006 pp 107-114)

Michael Cheatham, MD, FCCM, is director of the surgical trauma intensive care unit at Orlando Regional Medical Center in Florida. He discusses his article published in the February issue of Critical Connections titled, "Consensus Definitions for Intra-Abdominal Hypertension and Abdominal Compartment Syndrome." Dr. Cheatham is vice president of the World Society of the Abdominal Compartment Syndrome and has studied the impact of elevated intra-abdominal pressures for more than a decade.

Michael Gropper, MD, PhD, is director of critical care medicine for the University of California San Francisco Medical Center and professor of medicine and anesthesiology at the medical school. He is one of the many healthcare professionals who have found success in implementing the Surviving Sepsis Campaign guidelines and discusses the strategies for implementation as well as the challenges his institution faced.

Anthony Slonim, MD, DrPH, FCCM, and Angela Hsu, MD, both from the Children's National Medical Center at the George Washington University School of Medicine in Washington, D.C., discuss their article in the February issue of Critical Connections, titled "Preventing Pediatric Trauma: The Role of the Critical Care Professional." They focus on the different levels of prevention in this patient population and how critical care professionals can play a more active role in making sure fewer young patients are treated for trauma. (Crit Conn 2006 Vol.5 No.1)

Mitchell Levy, MD, FCCM, and Jean-Louis Vincent, MD, PhD, FCCM, discuss their article in the October issue of Critical Care Medicine. The article, "Early Changes in Organ Function Predict Eventual Survival in Severe Sepsis," can help clinicians identify variables associated with good outcomes in sepsis. The authors explain that if patients with sepsis are not getting better at the end of 24 hours, they may be getting worse. (Critical Care Medicine, Volume 33(issue 10) October 2005 pp 2194-2201).

Gordon Bernard, MD, serves as the ARDSNet Steering Committee Chairman and shared his knowledge of the ARDSNet project with attendees of the 35th Critical Care Congress during his keynote presentation,"ARDSNet: Success and Challenges of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute's First Critical Care Research Network." Dr. Bernard is the Melinda Owen Bass professor of pulmonary medicine, assistant vice-chancellor for research and director of the division of allergy, pulmonary, and critical care medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Tennessee.

Lt. Col. Chet Morrison, MD, director of surgical critical care at Michigan State University, shares his experiences serving as a military surgeon in Iraq and gives insight to critical care in combat settings.

Timothy Quill, MD, one of seven prominent critical care leaders presenting during the plenary sessions at the 35th Critical Care Congress, discusses the Terry Schiavo case and how courts have played a role in end-of-life decision making. Dr. Quill is a professor of medicine, psychiatry and medical humanities, as well as the director of the Center for Palliative Care and Clinical Ethics at the University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, N.Y.

The Society's of Critical Care Medicine's incoming president, Charles Durbin Jr., MD, FCCM, discusses the goals he would like to help the Society achieve as well as current topics in the profession, including implementing guidelines in critical care and utilizing the multiprofessional team.

J. Randall Curtis, MD, MPH, discusses his article in the December 2005 issue of Critical Connections, "Improving Family Conferences About End of Life Care in the ICU." Dr. Curtis is the director of the end-of-life research program at the University of Washington in Seattle. He shares advice on how healthcare professionals can build trust with families with open and honest conversations about patient care and offers techniques and procedures associated with "successful" family conferences. (Crit Conn 2005 Vol.4 No.6)