Critical care at UCLH includes:
Critical Care Unit (UCH Tower, 3rd Floor): With a capacity of 23 beds, this unit specialises in providing comprehensive critical care treatment for patients predominantly with medical emergencies originating from various sources including the Emergency Department, our wards or as tertiary referral transfers from other hospitals.
Post-operative Care Unit (PACU) (UCH Tower, 6th Floor): Equipped with 10 beds, this unit delivers post-operative critical care treatment for complex perioperative surgical patients after their planned procedures.
Grafton Way (Grafton Way Building, 1st Floor): Comprising of 10 beds, this unit offers tailored critical care for Haematology/Oncology patients, as well as post-operative care for elective orthopaedic surgical patients.
Westmoreland Street Critical Care Unit (1st Floor at WMS): Equipped with 9 beds, this unit provides post-operative care and critical care treatments for our complex elective (planned) urology and thoracic surgical patients, including tertiary referral transfers, along with facilitating support for any medical emergencies that occur in the hospital.
All these units are overseen and staffed by the same comprehensive multidisciplinary team, led by Consultants to ensure high-quality care delivery.
There is also a highly specialised Neurosurgical and Neuromedical Critical Care Unit, based at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (NHNN) at Queen Square. Located across two floors: the first floor Chandler Wing (ICU1, HDU1 and HDU2) and the ground floor Chandler Wing (ICU0).
The UCLH Critical Care Unit is one of the largest units in the country, providing a high standard of care for over 3000 patients per year. National intensive care audits have shown that our survival rates are among the highest in the country.
- The unit is supported by a multi-denominational chaplaincy department.
- A clinical psychologist is available via appointment to support patients and relatives. Please email uclh.
criticalcarepsychology if you would like psychological support.@nhs.net - There is a relatives’ room on the unit for daytime use and evenings up to 22:00. Advice is available for relatives regarding local accommodation if required.
- Patients are supported by our extensive multidisciplinary team including doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, pharmacists, a dietician and other members for the team.
A critical care follow-up pathway is available to patients who have been in the critical care unit for three days or more. We will contact you to review your recovery, either by telephone, MyCare (the UCLH digital patient portal) or post.
Reviews are conducted around four to six weeks from your hospital discharge and are carried out by an experienced critical care nurse who now specialises in follow-up. Exploring your recovery will allow us to assess your physical and emotional wellbeing following your admission to critical care and to consider what help, advice or further support may be beneficial.
We may then invite you to our multidisciplinary critical care follow-up clinic to support your recovery further.
Our critical care follow-up clinic team consists of:
- a clinical nurse specialist,
- a psychologist,
- a physiotherapist and/or occupational therapist
- a critical care doctor.
If you were in critical care at UCLH for three days or more and have not received a follow-up call from our team 2 months after your hospital discharge, and would like a call, please contact us at uclh.
Similarly, if you were not in critical care for three days or more but would appreciate a follow-up call from us, please do not hesitate to contact the above email address.
At the critical care follow-up clinic appointment, you will be able to:
- Ask us any questions about your critical care stay
- Tell us about any physical health concerns that you have as a result of being in critical care
- Tell us about the psychological impact of your critical care admission and recovery from this.
- Obtain advice about how to deal with ongoing physical and emotional concerns
- Discuss being referred or signposted to other teams or services that you may want to speak to, which may include a referral to our outpatient psychology clinic or community therapy services.
- Check on the status of any UCLH appointments with other teams in the trust
- Provide feedback to us about your critical care and hospital experience
The follow-up clinic appointment can be facilitated via video, telephone or in person, dependent on clinical need or personal preference.
Online drop-in peer support group
We also run an online monthly drop-in peer support group. The critical care peer support group (CCPS) is an informal, friendly group for people who were admitted to critical care at UCLH. At the sessions, members share their own experience of critical care and hear other members’ stories of recovery and experiences.
Joining a peer support group can help to increase social connection, help make sense of events, normalise people’s experiences, reduce distress, empower, and help share skills and support. The meetings usually last for around 60-90 minutes. Evidence shows that getting support from people who have been through similar challenges can increase resilience, wellbeing and reduce feelings of isolation.
To find out more about the group, please email uclh.criticalcarepeersupport@nhs.net
For more information on recovery post critical care, please navigate to:
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Nursing roles in Critical Care at University College London Hospital
