Trauma Anesthesiology

The mission of the Section of Trauma is the resuscitation and perioperative care, including pain management, of every patient at the Shock Trauma Center; the hands-on instruction of paramedics, nurses, medical students, residents and fellows; and the discovery and promulgation of new and better ways of caring for injured patients.

The Section of Trauma Anesthesiology includes 12 attending anesthesiologists and 20 CRNAs, performing more than 6,000 anesthetics each year. The Section of Trauma Anesthesiology is the only group of anesthesiologists in the country with a practice focused specifically on traumatic injury, and offers the only Fellowship in Trauma Anesthesia. The Section trains 25 anesthesia residents each year, rotating in one-month blocks from the University of Maryland, Johns Hopkins, and the three armed services.

An anesthesiologist is present at every patient's admission to the Shock Trauma Center, to assess and manage the airway and facilitate early pain control. An Attending Anesthesiologist is available 24 hours a day for emergency airway management in the ICUs, for conscious sedation procedures, and for comprehensive perioperative care in the TRU, OR, and PACU.

Trauma Anesthesiology at University of Maryland School of Medicine

Shock Trauma's anesthesiologists are faculty members at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Review their biographies, research and publications.

Representatives of the Section also train and supervise the nurses of the Acute Pain Management Service, providing advanced pain management modalities for more than 1500 patients each year. Forty Emergency Medicine residents per year rotate through the Section to learn advanced airway and resuscitation skills, along with 50 student nurse anesthetists and the 50 flight paramedics of the Maryland State Police. Anesthesiologists from the Section teach every University of Maryland medical student, in a special "hands-on" airway management course in the third year, and again as they rotate through the STC during their anesthesia training.

Research endeavors of the Section of Trauma Anesthesiology include studies of airway management techniques and protocols, anesthetic drug selection, advanced resuscitation techniques for patients in hemorrhagic shock, early noninvasive monitoring of traumatic brain injury, and non-surgical approaches to hemostasis. In the intensive care units, members of the Section have recently presented and published work on advanced ventilator management, continuous renal replacement therapy, trans-esophageal echocardiography, and extra-corporeal circulation. The MDs and CRNAs of the Section are the acknowledged national experts on anesthesia for trauma care, are sought out for textbook chapters in the Anesthesia, Surgical, and Critical Care arenas, and serve as invited speakers at local, national, and international conferences on a regular basis.