Fernando Dias is Head of the Department of Critical Care at the Hospital Pompéia in Caxias do Sul, Brazil. He graduated with a Degree in Medicine from the Federal University of Santa Maria in 1977, Brazil, followed by a medical residency in cardiology at Instituto de Cardiologia do Rio Grande do Sul in 1979. Between 1983 and 1989 he joined the staff of surgical critical care unit at the Instituto de Cardiologia do Rio Grande do Sul before moving to Pontificia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS) in 1989. In PUCRS was Director of the Cardiac Surgical Unit from 1989 to 1997 and of the General Intensive Care Unit from 1992 to 2013. Dr Dias has a degree in intensive care medicine from the Brazilian Intensive Care Association (AMIB) since 1985, a Master's Degree in Postgraduate Course in Medicine from the Instituto de Cardiologia do Rio Grande do Sul in 1997 and completed his PhD in Cellular and Molecular Biology at PUCRS in 2008. Dr. Dias was president of Critical Care Society of Rio Grande do Sul (SOTIRGS) in 1995/1996 and President of AMIB in 2014/2015. Dr Dias has extensive experience in medicine, focusing on intensive care but with specific interests in hemodynamic monitoring, sepsis, acute respiratory distress syndrome, shock and multiple dysfunction organs and systems and genetics in critical illness. He is Editor of books on shock and monitoring in critical care and has published in the fields of hemodynamic monitoring, sepsis and genetics in critical illness.