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

So, this morning, I was talking to a client, and she said that her 74-year-old mom has been in ICU for the last two weeks with COVID pneumonia. And she’s been on BIPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure) with a mask for the last two weeks. They have tried proning but didn’t succeed, it’s too painful for her mom. And now, they have maximized BIPAP on the oxygen level. So, she’s on 100% of FiO2 (Fraction of Inspired Oxygen), 100% of oxygen. Just for everyone’s reference, the air that you and I are breathing, room air or air out in the open, is 21%. So, she’s now on 100%. So, they’ve maximized that. She’s on inspiratory pressure of 16 centimeter of water and expiratory pressure of 12 on a rate of 20 breaths per minute, delivered by the machine. And her PO2 (Partial Pressure of Oxygen) in the blood gas is pretty poor and she can barely have any more time off the ventilator as her oxygen saturation just keeps dropping and she gets blue and cyanotic pretty quickly. Her CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) is normal, but the family is basically asking that the hospital is saying either hospice or intubation and induced coma, and then treat the COVID pneumonia from there.

Now, we haven’t looked at medical records yet. And we haven’t spoken to the doctors yet, but with the information that the family has shared with us, we would say there’s not much room, but to intubate, if you want to save your mom’s life and then treat the COVID pneumonia from there and see how she goes.

That is my quick tip for today.

If you have a loved one in intensive care, go to intensivecarehotline.com. Call us on one of the numbers on the top of our website, or simply send us an email to [email protected].

Also, have a look at our membership for families in intensive care, where you have access to me via email and you also have access to all of our eBooks and videos. That’s at intensivecaresupport.org.

If you need a medical record review, please let us know as well. We can provide a medical record review, especially if you are suspicious of any medical negligence. If you want to dig really deep on what’s exactly happening in ICU, then you should contact us for a medical record review.

It all comes down to that the biggest challenge for families in intensive care is simply that they don’t know what they don’t know. They don’t know what to look for. They don’t know what questions to ask. They don’t know their rights and they don’t know how to manage doctors and nurses in intensive care.

Now, like the video, give it a thumbs up, share it with your friends and families and subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families in intensive care and also, where I do a regular YouTube live, where I answer your question live on a YouTube stream, click the notification bell, and comment below what you want to see next, or what questions and insights you have.

Thanks for watching.

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