OVERVIEW Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome  (ARDS) is an acute diffuse, inflammatory lung injury, leading to increased pulmonary vascular permeability, increased lung weight, and loss of aerated lung tissue with hypoxemia and bilateral radiographic opacities, associated with increased venous admixture, increased physiological…

definitions of acute lung injury (ALI) and acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) have varied over time. ARDS was first described by Ashbaugh and Petty in 1967 in a case series of 12 ICU patients who shared the common features of unusually persistent tachypnea and hypoxemia accompanied by opacification on chest radiographs and poor lung compliance, despite different underlying causes