Critical Care Alert – February 1, 2018

February 1, 2018

• Atrial Fibrillation in Sepsis: Should We Worry?

  New-onset atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common occurrence in the ICU. Over the past decade, there is increasing interest in its epidemiology, specifically in the population of critically ill patients with sepsis. Recent literature suggests that far from a transient complication of sepsis, new-onset AF is associated with worse short- and long-term outcomes. As such, exploring its potential causes and evaluating its overall management is warranted in hopes of discovering ways to prevent and treat AF with the goal of improving outcomes for patients with sepsis.

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• Targeted Temperature Management: Determining Optimal Hypothermia Duration

  In unconscious survivors of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest who are admitted to the ICU, targeted temperature management at 33°C for 48 hours failed to significantly improve neurologic outcomes at six months when compared to 24 hours.

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• Restrictive Transfusion Threshold Non-inferior to Liberal Threshold in High-risk Cardiac Surgery

  In patients at moderate to high risk of complications with cardiac surgery, a transfusion threshold of hemoglobin < 7.5 g/dL showed similar outcomes to a threshold of < 9.5 g/dL.

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