[Nursing approaches to improve extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) care in a pediatric intensive care unit].

Background: Medical technology advances have led to the increasingly frequent use of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) in intensive care unit applications. Four of the 26 patients treated using ECMO in 2009 at our hospital were under 18 years of age. Limited nurse experience with ECMO and resultant nursing staff nervousness / pressure when using this technique encouraged us to establish an ad hoc group to explore ECMO care and related issues.

[Reducing patient pressure sore incidence in the surgical intensive care unit].

Background: Pressure ulcers were an increasingly significant problem among patients in the authors' ward. The eight patients diagnosed with pressure ulcers (0.42% of all inpatients) during the first half of 2009 represented a 140% increase over the first half of 2008 (0.