THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The government has decided to establish a department for critical care medicine in Thiruvananthapuram Medical College Hospital.
Announcing this, Health Minister Veena George said it will be the first such department in a government hospital in Kerala. Veena said the government has approved the creation of six posts – one associate professor and five senior resident posts – for the department. She said the plan is to start a DM course in critical care and create more experts in this field.
Terming critical care an excellent system of treatment that helps give a lease of life to patients suffering from the most complex medical conditions, Veena said critical care departments provide expert treatment to patients facing organ failure due to serious infections and enable their survival.
She said critical care treatment is provided in the multidisciplinary ICU at Thiruvananthapuram MCH.
Critical care departments have people trained in advanced ventilator management and critical care, Veena said, adding that state-of-the-art systems, including ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) machine, that are required for critical care are in place at the MCH to treat low blood oxygen levels.