Intensive care medicine in 2050: nanotechnology. Emerging technologies and approaches and their impact on critical care

Excerpt

Some techniques are only imagined, while others are at various stages of testing or actually being used today. Nanotechnology is expected to make diagnosis possible at the cellular and even the sub-cellular level. Currently, the comprehensive monitoring, control, construction, repair, defense and improvement of all human biologic systems, working from the molecular level, using engineered nano-devices and nanostructures are available in cancer. Given the current speed of innovation, it is difficult to anticipate what will be available or not in more than 30 years. A variety of emerging nanotechnologies are rapidly growing to a level of maturity; we believe that in 20–30 years they will be adopted as standard procedures in daily practice in intensive care units (ICU) [1]. Traditional medical devices attached to a patient are progressively evolving and being transformed by the introduction of nanoscience and nanotechnology into smart systems for continuous assessment for rapid critical care decision-making. …