Medizinische Klinik, Intensivmedizin und Notfallmedizin
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Death of intensive care unit (ICU) patients with cardiovascular implantable electronic devices (CIED) is a common scenario in the ICU. Given the demographic trends and the increasing implantation rate of such devices reinforces the fact that ICU physicians must be aware of the burden and consequences of these systems in the end of life care of dying patients. The possible deactivation of a CIED confronts the responsible physicians with particularly complex clinical, ethical, and legal problems. ⋯ It is therefore crucial to be aware of the legal situation in the jurisdiction in which the physician is practicing. The decision to deactivate CIEDs should be part of a well deliberated and transparent process. Ethical and legal guidance should be readily available to counsel and support these difficult decisions.
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Modern intensive care is responsible both for curative interventions in critical health situations and palliative terminal care for the dying ICU patient. By applying an integrated ethics approach, this article examines organizational and cultural factors shaping good terminal care in the ICU. ⋯ Among them, the article focuses on practices ensuring a dignified dying process, on the structured engagement of patients' families, on respecting cultural and spiritual values, and on a clinical pathway for terminal care as an institutional framework. In conclusion, it becomes evident that good terminal care in the ICU not only depends on ethically sound decisions on withholding or withdrawing medical interventions but also on organizational and cultural aspects which must be acknowledged and shaped.
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Med Klin Intensivmed Notfmed · Feb 2014
Review[Intensive and palliative care medicine. From academic distance to caring affection].
Intensive care medicine has made great contributions to the immense success of modern curative medicine. However, emotional care and empathy for the patient and his family seem to be sparse. There is an assumed constraint to objectivity and efficiency, as well as a massive economic pressure which transfers the physician into an agent of the disease instead of a trustee of the ill human being. ⋯ Despite great workload stress enough time for such conversation should be taken, because the physician will generously be repaid by the way he sees his medical activity. The maintenance of a culture of empathy within the intensive care team is a major task for the leader. In this manner, the ICU will become and remain a place for living humanity.