Level 3: Advanced Course in Acute Respiratory Failure & Mechanical Ventilation

Last updated : 12/05/2026 - 3565 views

The Advanced Course in ARF & MV will integrate at an advanced level topics such as COPD and Weaning (SBT). Interactive lectures will alternate with clinical case discussions, practical demonstrations and discussion of techniques.

As a participant – you have access to the virtual classroom on the ESICM ACADEMY

Faculty

ARF & MV Pathway Directors

  • Luigi CAMPOROTA MD, PhD, FRCP, FFICM, FERS Joan Reece Chair in Critical Care, Professor, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Surgery and Cancer, Division of Anaesthetics, Pain Medicine, and Intensive Care (APMIC), Imperial College London, London, United Kingdom
  • Lise PIQUILLOUD MD, PhD Deputy ICU Physician, Adult Intensive Care Unit, University Hospital of Lausanne, Switzerland; Senior lecturer University of Lausanne, Switzerland; Chair elect ARF section ESICM

Course Directors Level 3:

  • Leo HEUNKS MD, PhD Professor, Pneumologist-intensivist, Department of Intensive Care, Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
  • Massimo Antonelli MD Professor of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore; Director of the Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A.Gemelli IRCCS, Rome, Italy

Endorsement: The course is endorsed by the Acute Respiratory Failure Section, ESICM.

Objectives
  • Respiratory support in asthma and COPD
    • Understand the consequences of high airway resistance on ventilation strategy
    • Discuss controlled ventilation in COPD
    • Evaluate how to select patients with long term benefit from invasive ventilation
    • Evaluate initial respiratory support including NIV in AE-COPD
    • Discuss acceptable arterial pH during controlled ventilation and role for ECCO2R
    • Assess PEEPi and set PEEPe during assisted ventilation
    • Determine when to extubate
    • Evaluate how to treat dyspnoea during assisted ventilation
    • Demonstrate asynchrony
  • Weaning from invasive ventilation
    • Discuss SBT: why, when and how                                                  
    • How to wean neurological patients from the ventilator     
    • Get new insights tracheostomy to optimize weaning        
    • Identify cardiac origin of weaning failure 
    • Understand the role for inspiratory muscle strength training to facilitate weaning
    • Decide when to remove tracheostomy tube?
    • Determine how to prevent reintubation after difficult weaning: NIV or HFNO 
    • Set a framework to optimize weaning
Programme Content
  • Noninvasive respiratory support in acute hypoxemic failure
    • P-SILI in non-intubated patients
    • Physiological effects of HFNO vs NIV
    • Advanced respiratory support during NIV
    • Advanced respiratory support during NIV
  • Lung protective ventilation under assisted modes
    • ARDS subphenotypes and lung protective strategies
    • Energy delivered by ventilator and lung damage
    • Controlled and assisted mode impact on the lung
Requirements to join the course
  • Completed the ESICM Foundation course in ARF & MV
  • OR
  • Intensivist (in training), Anaesthesiologist (in training), or physician with at least 2 years of clinical experience in intensive care with ventilated patients
  • OR
  • Registered ICU Nurse / respiratory therapist with at least two years of experience treating ventilated patients
Accreditation

An application will be made to the UEMS EACCME® for CME accreditation of each live event.