A multicase study of a prolonged critical illness in the intensive care unit: Patient and family trajectories

Introduction: For most patients admitted to the ICU their length of stay is of short duration, with the median length of stay being 2.6 days. A consequence of advances in life-sustaining therapies is the emergence of a group of patients that survive their initial critical illness but become dependent on life-saving interventions for a prolonged period of time. Internationally researchers demonstrate that 5–10% of ICU patients have a prolonged stay, using 25–30% of ICU bed days. Therefore a prolonged stay has serious implications for patients, families, clinicians and the healthcare services.