Oxygen therapy and ventilatory support are often used to avoid hypoxemia and respiratory failure for patients in the perioperative and acute care settings, including the operating room, ICU, and ED. According to the severity of the patients’ illness, anesthesiologists, intensivists, and physicians need to choose the optimal ventilatory modality, ranging from oxygen therapy by face mask or nasal cannula, through noninvasive ventilation mode such as continuous positive airways pressure, to invasive ventilatory support with endotracheal intubation and tracheotomy, and the optimal ventilatory settings including tidal volume, respiratory rate, positive end expiratory pressure, the ratio of inspiratory to expiratory time, and recruitment manoeuvre. However, respiratory support per se, especially endotracheal intubation and tracheotomy, is not without any risk and can expose patients to risk of complications, even harms. Therefore, professional staffs should weigh the trade-off between potential benefits and possible risks associated with respiratory support.

Guest editors of Canadian Respiratory Journal planned to launch a new issue. This special issue is intended to present and discuss new breakthroughs and discoveries on respiratory support in both perioperative and acute care settings. We solicit high quality, original research articles as well as review articles focused on this topic. We also welcome theoretical papers, methodological studies, and empirical researches.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Mechanical ventilation strategy in intensive care setting, especially in patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome
• Mechanical ventilation during general anesthesia with emphasis on protective ventilation strategy for healthy lungs, especially in patients with one-lung ventilation, prone position, obesity, or laparoscopic surgery
• Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) for respiratory support in the critically ill patients
• Noninvasive mechanical ventilation in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)
• High-flow nasal cannula oxygen therapy for patients with acute respiratory failure or postextubation
• Tracheotomy technique for critically ill and surgical patients, especially the optimal timing of tracheotomy and ultrasound as an adjunct to facilitate tracheotomy