In this episode of Fight Back, we get an insider’s look at Intensive Care Units.
We are privileged to interview Dr. Wes Ely, author of Every Deep-Drawn Breath: A Critical Care Doctor on Healing, Recovery, and Transforming Medicine in the ICU.
Dr. Ely sheds light on what patients and their loved one’s experience when entering an ICU, how mental health plays such a significant role for an ICU patient’s mind and body, the potential long-term effects from a stay in an ICU (known as Post Intensive Care Syndrome), the ways that COVID has led to changes in how ICU medical teams treat their patients, and so much more.
Dr. Ely is an internist, pulmonologist, and critical care physician and serves as the Grant W. Liddle endowed chair in medicine and is a physician-scientist and tenured professor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He is also the associate director of aging research for the Tennessee Valley Veteran’s Affairs Geriatric Research Education Clinical Center (GRECC). He is the founder and co-director of the Critical Illness, Brain Dysfunction, and Survivorship (CIBS) Center, an organization devoted to research and ongoing care for people affected by critical illness. In addition to his book, Dr. Ely has had numerous studies published in The New England Journal, JAMA, and The Lancet, and his writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA TODAY, StatNews, The Daily Beast, and many other publications.