Critical Care Nursing of the Oncology Patient

Over the past decade, medical advances have reshaped nursing’s approach to patients with cancer, redefining care settings and allowing for more aggressive treatments. As a result, patients with cancer often require additional time in an intensive care unit after treatment. As care for these patients continues to evolve, so too must the knowledge and competencies of nurses from both the critical care and oncology specialties. Traditionally, these two specialties functioned independently, leaving nurses lacking an understanding of the responsibilities and strengths of both. Critical Care Nursing of the Oncology Patient arms nurses with knowledge of how to use aspects of both specialties to optimally care for patients with cancer, including working collaboratively throughout the transition from the medical-surgical floor to the intensive care unit and back to the medical-surgical floor. With additional topics on pharmacology, vascular access, palliative care, ethics, and interventions for a multitude of cancer types and conditions, this text is a valuable reference tool of past and current nursing treatments and critical care issues that will empower nurses to consider themselves both oncology and critical care nurses.