Post-Intensive Care Syndrome: Recognizing the Critical Need for Psychiatric Care

Abstract

Post-intensive care syndrome (PICS) is a rapidly growing phenomenon in older adults. As survival rates from ICU hospitalizations have increased over the past few decades, the long-term cognitive, psychological, and physical sequelae of the illness have become a major challenge in critical care medicine. More than half of all ICU survivors suffer from at least one PICS-related impairment, and these effects can persist as long as 5 or more years.