From intensive care to critical care medicine: a historical perspective

The evolution of Critical Care Medicine is traced in relationship to its predecessors, namely Intensive Care and Intensive Therapy. This commentary documents the initial physical care rendered by professional nurses in hospitals of the 19th century in locations close to the nursing stations. The development of incubators for newborns and life-support devices to support ventilation and renal function or to reverse fatal arrhythmias characterized Intensive Therapy of the early 20th century. In the most recent 50 years, Critical Care evolved for comprehensive, largely electronic monitoring and automated laboratory measurements to guide intensive therapy of multiorgan failures by critical care physicians and nurse specialists, pharmacists, and respiratory therapists using multiple life-support methodologies and devices.