Wes Ely

Physician-scientists from Vanderbilt University Medical Center were well represented at the recent annual meeting of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), Association of American Physicians (AAP) and the American Physician-Scientist Association.

Vanderbilt research shows that critically ill COVID-19 patients on a mechanical ventilator or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation lived more often when randomized to receive baricitinib.

Hospitalized patients with COVID-19 who received the rheumatoid arthritis drug baricitinib, in combination with the standard of care including corticosteroids, died less often than those receiving only the standard of care, according to a study released this week in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.

Delirium, a form of acute brain dysfunction, is widespread in critically ill patients in lower resourced hospitals, and the duration of delirium predicted both mortality and disability at six months after discharge, according to a study published in PLOS ONE.

Vanderbilt University Medical Center will study adult survivors of medical and surgical intensive care at high risk for long-term cognitive impairment to see if computerized cognitive rehabilitation (CCR) is effective in improving cognition in ICU survivors who often have trouble doing complex tasks, maintaining their finances and staying employed.

Intensive care unit delirium, a fertile area of clinical research and patient care innovation associated with VUMC, is beginning to reshape how commercial electronic health record systems are engineered with regard to intensive care.

Critically ill patients are not benefiting from antipsychotic medications that have been used to treat delirium in intensive care units (ICUs) for more than four decades, according to a study released today in the New England Journal of Medicine.