Respiratory failure is a complex disease process whereby the underlying disease and therapeutic measures interact. This book contains an extensive bibliographic review, focusing on preventive and therapeutic studies, that was methodologically standardized, with authors assessing and classifying studies according to statutes of evidence-based medicine. It considers the epidemiology and outcome of mechanical ventilation; addresses ventilator modes and utility of pulmonary mechanics monitoring for treatment; analyzes physiologic effect and patient-outcomes of pulmonary recruitment and lung...

Hemodynamic monitoring is one of the major diagnostic tools available in the acute care setting to diagnose cardiovascular insufficiency and monitor changes over time in response to interventions. However, the rationale and efficacy of hemodynamic monitoring to affect outcome has come into question. We now have increasing evidence that outcome from critical illness can be improved by focused resuscitation based on existing hemodynamic monitoring, whereas non-specific aggressive resuscitation impairs survival. Thus, this book frames hemodynamic monitoring into a functional perspective...