Postoperative and Recovery Care

Care and techniques delivered after a procedure or a sedative or anesthetic episode to support a patient's recovery, rather than a technique delivered to prepare for, numb or sustain a patient during the procedure itself. This includes the dedicated postoperative recovery setting (post-anesthesia care unit), postoperative nutritional support (enteral nutrition, parenteral nutrition, and gastric intubation used for feeding), a postoperative breathing exercise device used to prevent lung complications after surgery (incentive spirometer), a historical postoperative bowel-gas relief technique (Harris flush), and a postoperative cooling technique (pumpable ice technology). A technique whose defining purpose is anesthesia, sedation, airway management, resuscitation or preoperative preparation is grouped elsewhere even when it continues into the recovery period.