Plant Toxicity
Severe toxicity from plants is rare in humans; risk assessment is often difficult - plant identification may be difficult; - toxin quantification may be impossible
Category CCC
The LITFL Critical Care Compendium is a comprehensive collection of pages concisely covering the core topics and controversies of critical care.
Infections in the Immunocompromised
immunosuppression is increasingly common in the ICU and in the community; due to conditions such as chemotherapy and stem cell transplantation for cancer, solid organ transplantation, and therapies for autoimmune and rheumatological diseases; such patients are susceptible to the common pathogens seen as well as opportunistic pathogens
Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis
Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is the most common of the 7 types of idiopathic interstitial pneumonia (IIP)
Pneumonia in the Immunocompromised
The numbers of immunocompromised patients is increasing c/o improved solid-organ and haemopoietic transplants and the expanded use of immunomodulatory therapies. Pulmonary infections = most frequent complication with high mortality
Open Lung Biopsy
Biopsy should be taken from a representative area, not one with a high likelihood of non-specific fibrosis (eg. dependent segments of RML)
Biopsy should not be performed too late in disease process
Risks versus utility of information gathered must be weighed carefully
High Altitude illness
High altitude illness includes: acute mountain sickness; high altitude cerebral edema (HACE); high altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE); high altitude retinal haemorrhages
Oxygen Extraction Ratio
Oxygen extraction ratio (O2ER) is the ratio of oxygen consumption (VO2) to oxygen delivery (DO2)
Interpretative biases
Facts do not accumulate on the blank slates of researchers' minds and data simply do not speak for themselves
Dogma and Pseudoaxioms
Dogma is a belief generally held to be true by a group, organisation or professional body that is put forth as authoritative without adequate grounds. Axioms are universally accepted principles or rules. Pseudoaxioms, like pseudoscience, are "false principles or rules often handed down from generation to generation of medical providers and accepted without serious challenge or investigation"
Small bowel obstruction DDx
Key radiological features of small bowel obstruction are dilated bowel loops that are central, contain valvulae conniventes, and are pliable (“bent finger”).
Sepsis Definitions and Diagnosis
The original definitions of sepsis and related conditions (SIRS, severe sepsis and septic shock) are now more than 20 years old (Sepsis- 1 originated from the ACCP/SCCM consensus meeting in 1991 and Sepsis 2 from 2001)