Therapeutic Hypothermia Book

The use of hypothermia for a variety of therapeutic purposes has a long and erratic history. Hypothermia was used for protection and preservation of the heart and entire organism during planned operative ischemia. Attempts were also made to use hypothermia for resuscitation from cardiac arrest and for management of head trauma.

Therapeutic Hypothermia will provide a review of the subject, in particular, resuscitative hypothermia and include known mechanisms of action and results from both mechanistic and outcome laboratory studies and clinical trials. Cooling methods and potential side effects of hypothermia will be addressed as well as recommendations for future laboratory and clinical research.

This volume will be of interest to both the researcher interested in therapeutic hypothermia as well as the clinician interested in the potential use of therapeutic hypothermia in their patient population.

Doody Review Services

Reviewer:Amy C. Knutsen, MD(University of Minnesota Medical School)
Description:This is a compilation of basic science and clinical studies evaluating the utility and physiologic mechanisms of hypothermia. It is part of the series Molecular and Cellular Biology of Critical Care Medicine.
Purpose:Current basic science and clinical literature involving therapeutic hypothermia including proposed mechanisms, results from laboratory studies (both mechanistic and outcome) are reviewed. As a contribution to the critical care and surgical literature, this book includes multiple studies on protective, preservative, and resuscitative hypothermia.
Audience:Appropriate readers include critical care practitioners, surgeons, intensivists, cardiologists, emergency medicine physicians, and anesthesiologists.
Features:Content ranges from clinical studies involving cooling mechanisms, hemorrhagic and cardiogenic shock, and cardiac arrest to animal studies involving mechanisms of brain and spinal cord injury and ischemia. A review of animal studies on global brain ischemia begins the book, followed by several reviews of clinical and laboratory studies focusing on brain injury, sepsis, and shock. Figures and tables are included to illustrate specifics in the clinical studies. A chapter at the end of the book, which may be useful if read first, provides a broad overview and describes the complications of hypothermia. References in the 16 chapters date to within one year of publication and represent original work.
Assessment:This is a well-organized collection with a variety of studies and institutions represented. This is a controversial topic in evolution, and this book combines recent and historic perspectives on the use of resuscitative hypothermia in diverse patient populations. Conclusions offer anticipated directions and future studies to help elucidate combinations of therapeutic modalities.