Every Deep-Drawn Breath: A Critical Care Doctor on Healing, Recovery, and Transforming Medicine in the ICU

A world-renowned critical care doctor offers hope for ICU patients and their families in this timely, urgent, and compassionate narrative.Over the next ten years, 40 to 60 million people in this country will be admitted to the ICU. Most of these hospitalizations will be sudden, unexpected, and harrowing, experiences that can alter patients and their families physically and emotionally, with effects that endure for years. Every Deep-Drawn Breath is a rich blend of science, medical history, profoundly humane patient stories, and personal reflection. Dr. Wes Ely's mission is to prevent patients from being inadvertently harmed by the technology that is keeping them alive. Readers will experience the world of critical care through the eyes of this physician who drastically changed his clinical practice, and through cutting-edge research convinced others to do the same. For decades, millions of ICU survivors left the hospital with disabling symptoms including newly acquired dementia, depression, PTSD, and nerve damage, all now recognized as Post Intensive Care Syndrome, or PICS (a severe subset of Long Covid symptoms). Dr. Ely's groundbreaking investigations advanced the understanding of PICS and introduced crucial changes that reshaped intensive care: minimizing sedation, maximizing mobility, attending to the family, and providing supportive aftercare. Dr. Ely shows that this new way--technology plus touch--is the future of healthcare, and is a proven path toward reclaiming life. Full of wisdom and heart, Every Deep-Drawn Breath is an essential resource for anyone who will be affected by critical illness, which is all of us.

About the Author :
E. Wesley Ely, MD, MPH, is an internist, pulmonologist, and critical care physician. Dr. Ely earned his MD at Tulane University School of Medicine, in conjunction with a Masters in Public Health. He serves as the Grant W. Liddle endowed chair in medicine and is a physician-scientist and tenured professor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He is also the associate director of aging research for the Tennessee Valley Veteran's Affairs Geriatric Research Education Clinical Center (GRECC). He is the founder and codirector of the Critical Illness, Brain Dysfunction, and Survivorship (CIBS) Center, an organization devoted to research and ongoing care for people affected by critical illness. Dr. Ely has had numerous studies published in The New England Journal, JAMA, and The Lancet, and his writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA TODAY, and numerous other publications. He lives in Nashville. E. Wesley Ely, MD, MPH, is an internist, pulmonologist, and critical care physician. Dr. Ely earned his MD at Tulane University School of Medicine, in conjunction with a Masters in Public Health. He serves as the Grant W. Liddle endowed chair in medicine and is a physician-scientist and tenured professor at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He is also the associate director of aging research for the Tennessee Valley Veteran's Affairs Geriatric Research Education Clinical Center (GRECC). He is the founder and codirector of the Critical Illness, Brain Dysfunction, and Survivorship (CIBS) Center, an organization devoted to research and ongoing care for people affected by critical illness. Dr. Ely has had numerous studies published in The New England Journal, JAMA, and The Lancet, and his writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA TODAY, and numerous other publications. He lives in Nashville. Grover Gardner has recorded more than 650 audiobooks since beginning his career in 1981. He's been named one of the Best Voices of the Century as well as a Golden Voice by AudioFile magazine. Gardner has garnered over 20 AudioFile Earphones Awards and is the recipient of an Audio Publishers Association Audie Award, as well as a three-time finalist. In 2005, Publishers Weekly deemed him Audiobook Narrator of the Year. Gardner has also narrated hundreds of audiobooks under the names Tom Parker and Alexander Adams. Among his many titles are Marcus Sakey's At the City's Edge, as well as Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and John Irving's The Cider House Rules. Gardner studied Theater and Art History at Rollins College and received a Master's degree in Acting from George Washington University. He lives in Oregon with his significant other and daughter.