An intensive care unit has an oppressive or intimidating effect on many people, because the many devices and monitors to which a patient is often connected often make us fear the worst. Yet all of this serves only to improve monitoring so that the sick can be cared for particularly well. Find out what the intensive care unit is all about here.
What does an intensive care unit look like?
Just as the requirements differ from those of normal hospital wards, so do the equipment and spatial conditions. There is far more floor space, equipment, power and oxygen connections and support staff available per patient.
What is the equipment needed for in the ICU?
The devices in the ICU are used to continuously monitor so-called vital signs (signs that reflect body function) such as blood pressure, heart rhythm, body temperature, blood oxygen levels, as well as fluid balance and blood glucose, and to be able to intervene quickly if necessary.
The measured values are displayed on a monitor at the patient’s bedside and simultaneously in the monitoring room. In addition:
- Ventilators with tubes
- Electronically controlled syringe pumps through which painkillers and other drugs are given directly into blood vessels
- Gastric tubes and
- Other devices for monitoring, examinations and treatment
No wonder, then, that it flashes, rings and beeps and the affected person behind all the “machines” and tubes seems lost and small.
Sick people are especially cared for here
There is constant work going on at the bedside of the sick person – he is bedded, washed, patted down and rubbed, questioned, listened to and palpated, kept busy with physiotherapy and blood sampling. So it’s no wonder that in an intensive care unit there is usually an eerie bustle (and quite a bit of brightness), and as a family member you wonder how the sick person is supposed to get better despite the hectic pace and lack of privacy.
But remember: this is all to improve the patient’s health.
Special hygiene measures in the intensive care unit
Intensive care patients are often more susceptible to infection – to give as few pathogens a chance to enter as possible, you must first pass through an airlock before entering the actual intensive care unit.
Extensive disinfection, changing of clothes and donning of gowns, face masks, hoods, etc. are no longer necessary today – except in an isolation room for immunocompromised patients – but at least the hands are disinfected.
To enter an intensive care unit, you usually have to ring the bell and you will then be let in by the nursing staff. On the first visit, you may have to show identification.
Who works there and who can I talk to?
Interdisciplinary hospital intensive care units are usually led by an anesthesiologist; specific units may also be led by physicians in the relevant specialty, such as cardiologists.
In addition to physicians, there are specially trained nursing staff who have acquired special knowledge and are particularly able to deal with the special conditions in an intensive care unit (additional qualification “specialist nurse for anesthesia and intensive care medicine” or “specialist nurse for intensive care”).
In addition, other persons such as physiotherapists, occupational therapists, radiographers, etc. may also be admitted. have access. Since the various people are usually dressed similarly, relatives often do not know who is responsible for what. Then only one thing helps: ask.
