Overview: Critical care medicine is a relatively new specialty. Over the past few decades, we have seen an enormous growth in the number of inten- sive care units (ICUs) worldwide. Medical students, residents, fellows, attending physicians, critical care nurses, pharmacists, respiratory ther- apists, and other health-care providers (irrespective of their ultimate field of practice) will spend several months or years of their profes- sional lives taking care of critically ill or severely injured patients. These clinicians must have special training, experience, and compe- tence in managing comp
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