In Memory Of Pasquale Ciaglia
J Nates
Keywords
ards, cardiac, cardio-pulmonary support, care unit, ciaglia, critical care, education, emergency medicine, hemodynamics, intensive, intensive care medicine, medicine, multiorgan failure, neuro, obituary, patient care, pediatric, percutaneous, respiratory failure, surgical i, tracheostomy, ventilation
Citation
J Nates. In Memory Of Pasquale Ciaglia. The Internet Journal of Emergency and Intensive Care Medicine. 2000 Volume 5 Number 2.
Abstract
In Memory of Pasquale Ciaglia
Percutaneous tracheostomy was first introduced by Shelden et al. in 1955 (1), however, it was not until P. Ciaglia’s description of his novel technique in 1985 (2) that this approach started to spread around the USA and the rest of the world. Regardless of the multiple imitations since then, his technique has become a synonym of percutaneous tracheostomy to the point that many clinicians are not yet aware of the several techniques available (3). In my opinion, this confusion led to the lack of appropriate recognition of the amazing success of his technique (4) despite its impact in patient care since Ciaglia’s publication (5,6,7,8,9,10).
Dr. Ciaglia died a year ago, but not without taking his technique a step further by developing a promising simplified version of the original with multiple dilators (11). He was a wonderful human being, a caring physician, and had a great sense of humor and manners. He was truly a gentleman with a great mind; we will miss him and his poetic and scientific talents.
I could say many other things about him and still I would feel I have not said enough. Instead, and to honor him in this issue, we publish the obituary he wrote for himself titled “Obitulogy” (12).
Joseph L. Nates, M.D.
Editor-in-Chief IJEICM
