Caring for critically ill patients with a mental illness

A discursive paper providing an overview and case exploration of the delivery of intensive care to people with psychiatric comorbidity.

Dylan Flaws, Sue Patterson, Todd Bagshaw, Kym Boon, Justin Kenardy, David Sellers, Oystein Tronstad Nursing Open DOI: 10.1002/nop2.1935

Aim: To address the need for additional education in the management of mental illness in the critical care setting by providing a broad overview of the interrelationship between critical illness and mental illness. The paper also offers practical advice to support critical care staff in managing patients with mental illness in critical care by discussing two hypothetical case scenarios involving aggressive and disorganised behaviour. People living with mental illness are over-represented among critically unwell patients and experience worse outcomes, contributing to a life expectancy up to 30 years shorter than their peers. Strategic documents call for these inequitable outcomes to be addressed. Staff working in intensive care units (ICUs) possess advanced knowledge and specialist skills in managing critical illness but have reported limited confidence in managing patients with comorbid mental illness.