Critical care medicine deals with life support or organ support for patients who are critically ill. A critical care physician diagnoses, treats, and supports patients who may be in an intensive care unit, or who may have multiple organ dysfunction. Patients who receive intensive care treatment are usually critically ill patients who are treated after major surgery and require intensive monitoring. The critical care or intensive care physician may also communicate with the patient’s primary physician, other specialists, and the critical care staff to coordinate treatment and care.

Physicians in this specialty treat patients suffering from numerous diseases and illnesses, but some of the most common are trauma, cystic fibrosis, renal failure, liver failure, post-operative care, serious infections, acute lung injury, hemodynamic instability, hypoxic injury, reversible heart & lung dysfunction, multi-organ dysfunction, airway & respiratory compromise, cardiopulmonary failure, and circulatory failure.

Once properly diagnosed, practitioners can perform numerous procedures on patients including endotracheal tube, mechanical ventilation, tracheotomy, ecmo (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation), establishing central venous access, adial arterial catheterization, and passage of pulmonary arterial balloon flotation catheters.

To diagnose patients with possible illnesses and diseases, specialists will often perform one of many tests including magnetic resonance imaging (mri), computed axial tomography (ct or cat scan), blood test, and pulmonary function tests (pfts).

Doctor density varies by specialty and location. Kentucky has 99 practicing critical care medicine doctors. Broken out by city, critical care medicine doctor density in Ashland is 7, in Bardstown is 1, in Berea is 1, in Bowling Green is 8, in Corbin is 2, in Covington is 4, in Crestview Hills is 6, in Crittenden is 1, in Danville is 1, in Edgewood is 4, in Erlanger is 2, in Falmouth is 2, in Florence is 2, in Fort Mitchell is 4, in Fort Thomas is 1, in Frankfort is 1, in Frenchburg is 1, in Greensburg is 1, in Hazard is 3, in Henderson is 2, in Lancaster is 1, in Lexington is 28, in London is 2, in Louisville is 20, in Madisonville is 2, in Manchester is 1, in Maysville is 1, in Monticello is 1, in Morehead is 1, in Newport is 1, in Owensboro is 3, in Paducah is 2, in Pikeville is 2, in Prestonsburg is 1, in Regina is 1, in Richmond is 1, in Russell is 3, in Russell Springs is 1, in Russellville is 2, in Scottsville is 1, in Somerset is 4, in Southgate is 2, in Tompkinsville is 2, in Whitesburg is 1, and in Williamstown is 3.

Kentucky is known for its thoroughbred horses, tobacco and bourbon, but there’s much more. The Kentucky parks system draw thousands of visitors each year for swimming, boating, hiking, biking, and picnicking. The capital city is Frankfort, and has many historic homes and sites to visit, including the Old Governor’s Mansion, the Capital City Museum, and the Liberty Hall Historic Site. Visitors can explore a cave in Mammoth Cave National Park, or when in Louisville, hear authentic bluegrass music. Famous people born in Kentucky are former president Abraham Lincoln, fighter Muhammad Ali, and actor Johnny Depp.

According to 2005 Census estimates, Kentucky has a population of 4,173,405. Of this population, 959,891 are under the age of 18 and 522,811 are at or above the age of 65.