Cause of death in intensive care patients within 2 years of discharge from hospital.

Objective: To identify intensive care patients dying within 2 years of discharge from hospital and assess whether the cause of death was related to the diagnosis at hospital discharge.

Design, Setting And Participants: A retrospective cohort study of all patients admitted to the intensive care unit at Wellington Hospital, New Zealand, between 1 July 2001 and 30 June 2003, using data from the ICU database. Mortality data were obtained from the New Zealand National Death Registry.

Intensive care in an unusual setting: management of pneumonia in a chimpanzee.

We report a case in which intensive care doctors and nurses became involved in the care of a young chimpanzee who required ventilation for pneumonia at Wellington Zoo, New Zealand. This required staff to work outside the usual protected environment of a hospital intensive care unit. The chimpanzee, Bahati, was ventilated for 3 days, replicating intensive care practice, but died.