Intensive Care Medicine has been continuously growing and expanding,
culturally, technically and geographically. Monitoring and
instrumentation are continuously improving and more and more hospitals
are getting Intensive Care facilities. The costs have proportionally
increased over the years, so that ICUs represent today a major cost for
health structures. Since the available resources are limited, a real
need is emerging to set the limits and indications of Intensive Care. It
is understood that the problem not only involves medical considerations,
but also ethical and economical aspects of the utmost importance. For
the first time in Europe, this book edited by Reis Miranda and his
colleagues tackles systematically the many structural aspects of the
European Intensive Care. The organisation and financing of health care
in the Old Continent is deeply different from the American one, and the
results and consequent proposals obtained in the USA cannot simply be
transferred to this side of the Atlantic Ocean. Weare extremely pleased
to welcome this first European attempt to discuss the Intensive Care
problem. It lays no claims to giving definite replies in a continuously
developing field, but it will surely become the basis for future
discussions and proposals. I am particularly happy that this work has
mainly developed within the European Society of Intensive Care, whose
final target is to ensure a common standard of therapy in our old
Europe, beyond national differences. We warmly congratulate the authors,
and I am sure that their work will find wide diffusion and consent.