Critical care in India is currently at a crucial stage of development and requires a highly dedicated team of doctors, critical care nurses, technicians, and respiratory therapists. AVH is at the forefront of delivering advanced critical care services to Tirunelveli and its surrounding districts. Our ICU provides aggressive treatment, monitoring, and stabilisation for a variety of emergencies, with a focus on significantly reducing mortality rates, particularly in patients experiencing heart attacks, strokes, Adult Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) from various causes, and poisonings. Our teams are organised into specialised groups that not only manage the ICU but also collaborate with and support other departments.
Intensive Care Units (ICU): Patients in intensive care are often very ill and require close monitoring, with one nurse dedicated to each patient.
High Dependency Units (HDU): Patients in the HDU are generally less ill than those in the ICU but still require close observation. These patients are not yet fit to be transferred to the general ward. Some are admitted from the wards, while others are ‘stepped down’ from the ICU to the HDU, where they continue their recovery, often staying for a period before being discharged home.
Our patients are admitted to the ICU or HDU from the Emergency Department, operating theatres, wards, or other hospital departments, and sometimes from other hospitals.
Critical Care Outreach (MET Team): The critical care outreach team operates within the critical care department. They provide early, skilled assistance to ward staff caring for deteriorating patients, helping to prevent further decline and facilitating transfers to the ICU when necessary. To ensure continuity of care, the outreach team also reviews all discharges from the ICU to the wards. Additionally, these teams are experienced in transporting critically ill patients to higher centres for tertiary treatments such as ECMO.