Emergency medicine Australasia : EMA
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Emerg Med Australas · Apr 2021
Psychotropic medication use for paediatric mental health patients in an emergency department.
There is paucity of evidence for psychotropic medication use in children and adolescents presenting with mental health (MH) problems to the ED. We set out to describe paediatric psychotropic medication use in the ED. ⋯ A minority of children with MH presentations to the ED were medicated. It will require multicentre research to determine the most effective and safe acute psychotropic agents for oral and parenteral use in children in the ED.
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Emerg Med Australas · Apr 2021
Does volume or occupancy influence emergency access block? A multivariate time series analysis from a single emergency department in Sydney Australia during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The study aims to determine whether ED presentation volume or hospital occupancy had a greater impact on ED performance before and during the COVID-19 health response at a tertiary referral hospital in Sydney, Australia. ⋯ The main determinants of the reduction of ED overcrowding and access block during the pandemic were associated with reductions in hospital occupancy and elective surgery levels, and more research is required to assess more complex associations beyond the scope of this manuscript.
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Antifragility is a property of things that benefit from shocks, randomness and uncertainty and love adventure and risk. This describes emergency medicine. Improving evidence-based medicine requires a learning health system, where the whole system is constructed to advance patient care via research driven excellence. ⋯ Unfortunately, the human brain is hard wired for simplicity, making us disinclined to challenge the status quo. Yet probably <10% of our practice is supported by high-level evidence. Research is altruistic and a form of kindness for our patients, which includes having a culture of research within a learning health system, so that we can be thoughtful!