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Quick Tip for Families in Intensive Care: My Mom’s in ICU with Cancer and Sepsis. She’s Not Waking Up, ICU Wants to Stop Treatment, Help!

Hi, it’s Patrik Hutzel from intensivecarehotline.com with another quick tip for families in intensive care.

Currently we are working with one of our members as part of our membership for families of critically ill patients in intensive care who has her 63-year-old mother in ICU with bowel cancer and also the cancer has spread around the body. She’s in ICU, intubated, has respiratory failure, and she was on BiPAP (Bilevel positive airway pressure) before she ended up intubated.

The cancer, unfortunately, is spreading and the ICU is basically saying that the only option for this lady is palliative care and that, even if she was to survive intensive care, she won’t have any quality of life. It’s the usual doom and gloom and negativity talk from intensive care teams to try and rob families of hope, to try and rob families of any options, and to create the narrative that keeps the intensive care teams in control that in case things are not improving, they can say, “Well, we told you so”, instead of trying everything they can.

Anyway, here is what we advised our client and our member to do next. Given that she’s not waking up after the induced coma, there needs to be a neurologist consult because if she’s not waking up, she needs to have a CT scan of the brain, an MRI scan of the brain, potentially an electroencephalograph. Where is the intensive care team as well? She doesn’t need any of that because she’s dying anyway.

Now, when we look at the medical records, there’s no sign that, she’s dying immediately. Yes, she is on life support like many other patients in intensive care, she’s on ventilation, she’s got a breathing tube, she’s off sedation and, she’s on some vasopressors as well. But that’s nothing uncommon in ICU. Most patients are having this type of treatment anyway. And they do survive.

Next because the intensive care team says, well, she doesn’t need any more treatment for the cancer, there needs to be oncology input because the intensive care teams are not specialized on cancer treatment. The intensive care teams are fantastic to saving people’s lives. But then once they’ve saved lives, there needs to be ongoing treatment. And in this situation, rather than trying to coerce the family into withdrawing treatment, there needs to be input from other parties. The Intensive care team can’t manage everything by themselves. They need to include the specialties here as well. Same with the infection that this lady has. We advised our client and member to get infectious disease involved so that they’re treating the infection properly.

So, if you have a loved one in intensive care, and you can see that the intensive care team is adamant of wanting to move your loved one towards palliative care, towards end of life, what other specialists should be giving input first.

In this situation, it’s quite clear and it’s pretty clear in many other situations. This is not unique to this particular client or member. This happens all the time. We see it all the time with our clients. We always advise to get specialist input from whoever it is, cardiologist, neurologist, infectious disease, gastroenterologist, gastric surgeon, whatever the issue is, always get the specialist involved and ask for that next opinion.

So that is my quick tip for today.

If you want to become a member of our membership for families of critical patients in intensive care, you can do so by going to intensivecarehotline.com and click on the membership button or you can go directly to intensivecaresupport.org. There you have access to me and my team 24 hours a day in a membership area and via email and we answer all questions, intensive care related.

I also offer one on one consulting advocacy over the phone, via Skype, via email, via Zoom, via WhatsApp, whichever medium works best for you. I talk to you and your families directly. I talk to intensive care teams directly and ask all the questions that you haven’t even considered asking. But you must ask in order to get to make informed decisions, get peace of mind, control, power and influence.

I also represent you in family meetings with intensive care teams. Once again, I would not go into a family meeting without having an advocate like myself there without having any clinical representation there. You need to have someone that can help you make informed decisions, get peace of mind control power and influence. You need that outside view and that second opinion.

Talking about second opinion, we also do medical record reviews and give you that second opinion in real time by reviewing your loved ones’ medical records in real time. We also offer medical record reviews after intensive care if you have unanswered questions, if you need closure or if you are suspecting medical negligence.

Now, if you like my videos, subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families in intensive care, click the like button, click the notification bell, share the video with your friends and families and comment below what you want to see next or what questions and insights you have from this video.

Thanks for watching.

This is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecarehotline.com, and I will talk to you in a few days.

Take care for now.

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