Monitoring (medicine) in the context of Intensive care unit

Intensive care medicine, usually called critical care medicine, is a medical specialty that deals with seriously or critically ill patients who have, are at risk of, or are recovering from conditions that may be life-threatening. It includes providing life support, invasive monitoring techniques, resuscitation, and end-of-life care. Doctors in this specialty are often called intensive care physicians, critical care physicians, or intensivists.

Intensive care relies on multidisciplinary teams composed of many different health professionals. Such teams often include doctors, nurses, physical therapists, respiratory therapists, and pharmacists, among others. They usually work together in intensive care units (ICUs) within a hospital.

A medical test is a medical procedure performed to detect, diagnose, or monitor diseases, disease processes, susceptibility, or to determine a course of treatment. Medical tests such as, physical and visual exams, diagnostic imaging, genetic testing, chemical and cellular analysis, relating to clinical chemistry and molecular diagnostics, are typically performed in a medical setting.

Electrocardiography is the process of producing an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG), a recording of the heart's electrical activity through repeated cardiac cycles. It is an electrogram of the heart which is a graph of voltage versus time of the electrical activity of the heart using electrodes placed on the skin. These electrodes detect the small electrical changes that are a consequence of cardiac muscle depolarization followed by repolarization during each cardiac cycle (heartbeat). Changes in the normal ECG pattern occur in numerous cardiac abnormalities, including:

• Cardiac rhythm disturbances, such as atrial fibrillation and ventricular tachycardia;
• Inadequate coronary artery blood flow, such as myocardial ischemia and myocardial infarction;

• and electrolyte disturbances, such as hypokalemia.

Traditionally, "ECG" usually means a 12-lead ECG taken while lying down as discussed below.However, other devices can record the electrical activity of the heart such as a Holter monitor but also some models of smartwatch are capable of recording an ECG.ECG signals can be recorded in other contexts with other devices.

Electrophysiology (from Ancient Greek: ἤλεκτρον, romanized: ēlektron, lit. 'amber' [see the etymology of "electron"]; φύσις, physis, 'nature, origin'; and -λογία, -logia) is the branch of physiology that studies the electrical properties of biological cells and tissues. It involves measurements of voltage changes or electric current or manipulations on a wide variety of scales from single ion channel proteins to whole organs like the heart. In neuroscience, it includes measurements of the electrical activity of neurons, and, in particular, action potential activity. Recordings of large-scale electric signals from the nervous system, such as electroencephalography, may also be referred to as electrophysiological recordings. They are useful for electrodiagnosis and monitoring.