Intensive Care Medicine (ICM) Practice Exam

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Prepare for the Intensive Care Medicine (ICM) Exam. Study with comprehensive multiple-choice questions, gain insights with detailed explanations, and enhance your readiness. Achieve success on your ICM journey!

Each practice test/flash card set has 50 randomly selected questions from a bank of over 500. You'll get a new set of questions each time!

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Blood to the lungs is supplied by which arteries?

Pulmonary arteries
Pulmonary veins
Systemic arteries
Systemic veins

The correct answer is: Pulmonary arteries

The correct answer is the pulmonary arteries because they are specifically responsible for transporting deoxygenated blood away from the right side of the heart to the lungs. In the pulmonary circulation, the right ventricle pumps the blood into the pulmonary arteries, which then branch into the smaller arteries and arterioles within the lungs. This is where carbon dioxide is exchanged for oxygen, allowing for the oxygenation of the blood, which is a critical function in respiratory physiology. In contrast, the pulmonary veins return oxygenated blood from the lungs back to the left side of the heart; therefore, they do not supply blood to the lungs but rather carry blood away from them. The systemic arteries carry oxygen-rich blood from the left side of the heart to the rest of the body, whereas systemic veins return deoxygenated blood from the body back to the right side of the heart. Thus, the functionality and directionality of blood flow determine the roles of these vessels in the circulatory system, with the pulmonary arteries being the key vessels involved in delivering blood to the lungs for oxygenation.