Gastrointestinal dysfunction in the critically ill: can we measure it?

doi:10.1186/cc7001

Critical Care
Volume 12
Issue 5

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Commentary

Gastrointestinal dysfunction in the critically ill: can we measure it?

Rachel G Khadaroo and John C Marshall

Departments of Surgery and Critical Care Medicine, and the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, St. Michael's Hospital, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5B 1W8

author email corresponding author email

Critical Care 2008, 12:180doi:10.1186/cc7001


Published:	24 September 2008

See related research by Reintam et al., http://ccforum.com/content/12/4/R90, and related letter by Berger et al., http://ccforum.com/content/12/6/436

Abstract

Gastrointestinal dysfunction is an intuitively important, yet descriptively elusive component of the multiple organ dysfunction syndrome. Reintam and colleagues have attempted to quantify this dimension using a combination of intolerance of enteral feeding, and the development of intra-abdominal hypertension. While they show that both parameters are associated with an increased risk of death (and therefore that, in combination, the risk of death is even greater), they fall short in developing a novel descriptor of gastrointestinal dysfunction. Nonetheless, and even with its shortcomings, their effort is a welcome contribution to the surprisingly complex process of describing the morbidity of critical illness.