UNION HOSPITAL INTENSIVE CARE SERVCES

At Union Hospital, we combine state-of-the-art technology with a highly skilled and compassionate nursing staff to deliver the highest level of care for our most critical patients, those in our intensive care units.

We hope this site can explain what we do in Intensive Care, and help you to understand what is happening if you have a relative or friend being treated in an Intensive Care Unit. If you have trouble navigating the site, please ask your nurse to provide someone to assist you. Coping with critical illness in a loved one is always traumatic. We will do our best to help you through this difficult time. Please take some time to explore the site and find out more about Intensive Care Medicine.

Your opinion regarding our ICU is important to us. If you have recently been a patient in our ICU please click here and take our survey. Your responses to this survey are anonymous and will only be used to improve our ICU for future patients and families.

Advanced Intensive Care Unit

Union Hospital's Advanced ICU Care Program connects our local board-certified intensivists and certified critical care nurses to cutting-edge telemedicine technology and a continuous process improvement program. This program provides several benefits for our patients.

• Around-the-clock remote care and monitoring
• Improved patient safety
• Reduced rates of medical complications and mortality
• Shorter amount of time in the hospital

How it works

The Advanced ICU Care Program is an added benefit to our ICU services, not a replacement for an onsite physician or caregiver. Your local physician directs your care. Trained intensivist physicians in an Advanced ICU Care Program control center in St. Louis can constantly observe patients' vital signs and monitor their progress through high-definition cameras and direct diagnostic computer feeds.

The cameras can monitor fluctuations as miniscule as pupil dilation. Patients and their caregivers also can communicate directly and immediately with the Advanced ICU Care Program service whenever the need arises, right from patient rooms. This advanced system allows for a unique collaboration between caregivers at Union Hospital and board-certified intensivist counterparts offsite. The technology also includes a videoconference center for extensive and private interaction between local practitioners and Advanced ICU Care Program intensivists.

When not in use, cameras are turned away from patients and microphones become inactive to ensure patient privacy. The Advanced ICU Care Program is governed by the same federal privacy guidelines that cover the hospital.

Advanced ICU Care Program FAQ:

What is telemedicine?

Telemedicine is a technology that applies audio and video applications to patient and health care givers' interactions. This technology is used for the evaluation of specific problems to enhance diagnosis and treatment decisions, particularly by bringing medical expertise to an area that may lack it, e.g., dermatology to a remote setting.

What is an intensivist?

Intensivists are physicians who have received training in critical care beyond their primary residency. They initially train in and receive board certification in a specific medical specialty, such as surgery, internal medicine, pediatrics or anesthesiology. Subsequently, they train in and obtain a subspecialty certification specifically in critical care medicine. A unique feature of the training is collaboration with others to deliver optimized patient care. Intensivists deliver care in a hospital's intensive care unit (ICU), partnering with critical care team members including other consultant physicians, critical care nurses, pharmacists and respiratory therapists. They are generally the team leader, facilitating all members to meet the patient's complex needs. They are specially trained on all the organ systems, as well as the medications, procedures and technology specific to the treatment of critically ill patients. They also help to set policies, develop protocols and facilitate communication within the ICU.

What technology does the Advanced ICU Care Program use?

This Advanced ICU Care Program technology combines clinical management software with patient data and real-time video feeds, enabling the remote care and monitoring of critically ill patients. Part of the Advanced ICU Care Program technology platform is the eCareManager', a dashboard view of key patient information such as vital signs, physiologic data, medications, lab results and more ' giving remote clinicians the data they need to provide patient care. Remote care tools, such as cameras and videoconferencing, allow eICU physicians and nurses to see and communicate directly with patients, families and onsite clinicians. The system also provides automated alerts, which identify potential patient problems and allow physicians to intervene earlier..

Who does procedures/emergency procedures if they are needed?

All hospitals have processes in place to deal with common emergency procedures. These include dedicated in-house personnel (physician assistants, critical care nurse practitioners, house physicians, hospitalists, anesthesiology personnel and emergency department physicians) or specialty physicians on call from home (cardiologist for pacemakers, etc.). These processes remain in place, except that the call for the procedure would likely be initiated by the intensivist at the Advanced ICU Care Program, after discussion with the attending physician. If surgical evaluation is required, the process is the same - the Advanced ICU Care Program intensivist contacts the surgeon requested by the attending physician. Advanced ICU Care Program intensivists coordinate these activities, maintaining the nurse at the bedside.