The continuing evolution of pediatric critical care medicine

Article Outline

• Copyright

Since the administration of the first Pediatric Critical Care Medicine subspecialty examination in 1987, the American Board of Pediatrics has provided the public and medical community with an increasingly rich set of objective data to track the growth of this specialty, as well as the characteristics of trainees, and the geographic distribution and career choices of its practitioners. The latest report in this issue of The Journal will prove invaluable in anticipating the available critical care workforce.

The clarity of these supply data contrast with the unknown future demand for critical care physicians. Many units have already adopted in-house, 24 hour intensivist presence in critical care units and others are considering similar converage. The specialty is too young to estimate the expected career duration of intensivists, but it is likely to be shorter than that of specialists in other areas. These trends suggest that the specialty must continue to attract increasing numbers of trainees in order to meet current and future demands.