What is a critical care bed?

Critical care beds are usually located in an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) or Intermediate Care Unit. These are the places in the hospital where the very sickest patients are cared for. These patients need more intensive medical care than they could get in a regular hospital room.

Critical care beds usually have bedside monitors to allow close tracking of the patient’s heart and lung functions and may have ventilators to help patients who are not able to breathe well on their own. There are more nurses available to help these patients because they are so sick. The main doctors taking care of these patients may be specially trained in Critical Care Medicine. During the Corona Virus pandemic there may a shortage of equipped critical care beds due to a high number of seriously ill patients in the region. Also, there may not be enough experienced critical care doctors and nurses available to take care of so many very sick patients, especially since these invaluable healthcare workers are at high risk of becoming infected with COVID-19 themselves.