Department of Surgery

Surgical Critical Care

The Surgical Critical Care Program provides comprehensive multidisciplinary evaluation and management of surgical patients with critical illness. A team of board-certified critical care specialists manages patients' multisystem needs, including preoperative optimization, operative interventions, and postoperative care, in the six University of Maryland Medical Center's surgical critical care units (multitrauma, neurotrauma, select trauma, general surgical, neurosciences and cardiac surgery). The program's faculty have international recognition for excellence and expertise in the management of critical illness and specifically in the management of organ dysfunction, organ support therapies, sepsis, severe acute pancreatitis, peritonitis, and trauma.

Patient Conditions

• Critical illness following surgery or trauma
• High risk surgical patients
• Shock and hemodynamic compromise
• Acute lung injury and ARDS following surgery, trauma, or pancreatitis
• Sepsis and severe infections
• Trauma evaluation and management
• Neurologic emergencies
• Post-transplantation
• Post-operative complications
• Peritonitis, perforated viscus, and abdominal sepsis
• Enterocutaneous fistulas
• Gastrointestinal hemorrhage
• Severe acute pancreatitis
• Multisystem organ failure

Comprehensive Evaluations

• Multidisciplinary evaluation of critical illness
• Angiography
• CT scans
• MRI

Specialized Treatments

• Nutritional support
• Sepsis management
• Complex ventilator management
• Organ support
• Abdominal sepsis and peritonitis management
• Severe acute pancreatitis
• Cardiac assist devices

Special Programs

• Critical care transport
• Organ failure support therapies
• Sepsis and Surgical infections
• Neurological Critical Care

Special Programs

• Critical Care transport including aeromedical and land transport
• Organ failure support program including ECMO, CRRT, and liver support
• Sepsis and surgical infections
• Neurological critical care
• Severe acute pancreatitis
• Maryland Critical Care Network

Services to Physicians

• Consultations or second opinions on critically ill surgical patients
• Evaluation of critically ill surgical patients
• Critical care and operative management of complex surgical conditions
• Comprehensive organ support therapies
• Educational programs on critical care evaluation and management in surgical patients

Clinical Research Opportunities

The Surgical Critical Care program provides patients and physicians with opportunities to continually improve the field of critical care by participating in state of the art clinical research trials. Ongoing trails providing the most up to date management are available for:

• Sepsis and peritonitis
• Acute lung injury and ARDS (including ARDSNet trails)
• Severe acute pancreatitis
• Role of genomics and proteomics on inflammation and infection in critical illness
• Organ support therapies including extracorporeal organ support
• Minimally invasive hemodynamic monitoring
• Traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury