A serious illness that puts a person in the intensive care unit often occurs unexpectedly and catches loved ones unprepared.
Families and friends of patients suffering from a life-threatening illness are often thrust into a frightening realm, unsure if their loved ones will survive and, if they do, what the aftermath will be and what type of long-term care they will need to receive.
The stresses of dealing with intensive care units have intensified during much of the coronavirus pandemic, particularly in recent weeks as the rapidly spreading Omicron variant has filled emergency rooms and strained every type of critical care.
A Santa Fe doctor hopes to address some of these challenges in a newly released book that guides families through one of the worst situations they could find themselves in.
“I designed it so that exhausted, stressed people can easily read in the waiting room or at the bedside,” said Dr. Vincent Regional Medical Center.
The New York Times health columnist Jane E. Brody called Goitein’s book “extraordinarily thorough and helpful.”
“Ideally, families would have this book to hand, like a first aid manual, when needed, because the first few days in an ICU are often the most stressful and unsettling,” Brody wrote.
The book was also written by Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, who received a 2010 Pulitzer Prize for his book The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer.
Goitein, he wrote, has authored an essential guide to one of the most difficult journeys through one of the most difficult wards of any hospital.
Efforts by hospitals over the past decade to counsel families of ICU patients and direct them on how to deal with ongoing medical problems that require long-term care have been hampered by the pandemic, Goitein said, because medical staff have been overwhelmed. It has become difficult for them to do anything beyond basic care as they face a health care burden stemming from the exploding number of COVID-19 cases combined with increasing staff shortages.
Armed with a basic knowledge of medical procedures, family members can be much stronger advocates for patients, Goitein said. This ranges from knowing what questions to ask to ensuring a patient’s wishes are met when they are unable to work, particularly when it comes time to decide whether to end mechanical life support.
Although the book’s focus is the ICU stay, it also offers advice on planning long-term care and finding necessary medical services, which should be done before the person is discharged from the hospital, she said.
“It helps families a lot to have the right expectations,” she said. “The burden of care often lies with the relatives. It is important to be able to plan your life accordingly.”
Although most patients in the ICU survive and are discharged, approximately half experience “post-intensive care syndrome” or PICS, resulting in lingering cognitive, physical, or even emotional after-effects that can last for months or years.
The patients with PICS are generally those who require extended life support, e.g. B. Being on a ventilator for more than a few days, Goitein said, adding that most patients with severe COVID-19 are put on ventilators for a few weeks. “This is the sickest of the sick.”
Among patients who struggle with PICS, only one in five will achieve full independence within the first year after being hospitalized, she said.
One sixth goes straight home, the rest is transferred to a rehabilitation, nursing or acute care facility. A large part has to return to the hospital at least once.
And a third of patients with this syndrome will die within the first year of leaving the intensive care unit, Goitein said.
The good news is that most patients who make it three years after ICU are able to live independently, she added.
But families should know that a loved one surviving an extended stay in intensive care is only part of the battle.
“It’s definitely a long road,” she said.
source https://www.bisayanews.com/2022/01/23/santa-fe-doctors-book-helps-family-members-of-covid-19-patients-local-news/
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