Pulmonary & Critical Care

Maine Medical Center (MMC) is a major referral center for patients with pulmonary disease and critical illness in northern New England. The Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine and the Department of Critical Care are staffed by twelve full and part-time subspecialty faculty. In addition to being active clinicians, teaching faculty participate in the fellowship program, conduct research, and serve as teaching attendings for internal medicine residents and medical students. Each teaching attending has a faculty appointment from the University of Vermont College of Medicine.

The Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Division is responsible for supervising more than 75 highly trained technical professionals providing services in the Pulmonary Function Laboratory, Maine Sleep Institute, Tuberculosis Clinic, Adult Cystic Fibrosis Clinic, Cardio-Pulmonary Exercise Laboratory and Respiratory Therapy. The primary outpatient facility associated with the Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Division is located at Chest Medicine Associates, a training affiliate of Maine Medical Center. Each year, more than 500 flexible bronchoscopies, 2700 pulmonary function tests, 2100 sleep studies, and 80 cardio-pulmonary exercise studies are performed. In addition, rigid bronchoscopy, laser bronchoscopy, transthoracic needle aspiration, thoracentesis, and pleural biopsy procedures are performed routinely.

The Department of Critical Care is responsible for the supervision of a multidisciplinary 42-bed special care unit. This unit provides support for programs in cardiac surgery, pediatric cardiac surgery, trauma, burns, surgical and pediatric critical care. It is the critical care training source for residents in the departments of Medicine, Surgery, Pediatrics, Family Practice, Emergency Medicine, OB/GYN, and Anesthesiology. In addition to pulmonary and critical care medicine physicians, the critical care teaching faculty includes surgical critical care physicians, anesthesiologists, and a Ph.D. pharmacologist. The Special Care Unit is equipped with state-of-the-art technology and is supported by more than 130 critical care nurses. Professionals in the fields of nutrition, speech pathology, rehabilitation medicine, and respiratory therapy provide specialized consultation in patient care.