Rehabilitation in the ICU

Abstract

Prolonged stay in the ICU comes with a variety of sequelae evolving toward chronic conditions rendering rehabilitation a challenge for the medical staff and patients’ families. Functional impairment is physical (touching mainly mobility: weakness, atrophy), cognitive or beyond (dysphagia, chronic pain, risk of falls). Properly identifying the risk factors means addressing them in a preventive manner. The curative approach, due to fragmented trajectories and the controversies related to early mobilization and the dose of physical rehabilitation, is still subject to debate. Possible barriers to implementing rehabilitation protocols were identified as well as future research themes regarding new targets for interventions to be tested in large-scale randomized controlled trials.