HEADS UP
Over the last 25 years, refinements in ICU care meant that patients were discharged faster and had fewer lingering symptoms. COVID-19 undid nearly all our progress overnight.
E. Wesley Ely is the author of Every Deep Drawn Breath: A Critical Care Doctor on Healing, Recovery, and Transforming Medicine in the ICU. An internist, pulmonologist, and critical care physician, he 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.