Results below are from a search of PubMed and CINAHL for these concepts:

• patient education
• intensive care
• English language limit
• time/timing

PubMed:  “Patient Education as Topic”[MAJR] AND “intensive care”[mesh] AND english[lang]

CINAHL:  (MH “Intensive Care Units”) AND (MM “Patient Education+”) AND ( (time OR timing) )   This search focuses on papers that discuss some aspect of timing as it relates to patient education.  Removing the (time OR timing) part of the search will retrieve some additional papers discussing aspects, such as education for transition from ICU to general unit.

The PubMed search results are more general.  The references below discuss general aspects of patient education in the ICU.  Other references in the search results discuss patient education in specific situations, such as with patients on ventilators:

Häggström M, Asplund K, Kristiansen L.  How can nurses facilitate patient’s transitions from intensive care?: a grounded theory of nursing.  Intensive Crit Care Nurs. 2012 Aug;28(4):224-33

Scott A.  Managing anxiety in ICU patients: the role of pre-operative information provision.   Nursing in Critical Care (NURS CRIT CARE), 2004 Mar-Apr; 9 (2): 72-9.

Clark BJ, Moss M. Secondary prevention in the intensive care unit: does intensive care unit admission represent a “teachable moment?”. Crit Care Med. 2011 Jun;39(6):1500-6.