Emergency medicine Australasia : EMA
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Emerg Med Australas · Dec 2011
Sedation assessment tool to score acute behavioural disturbance in the emergency department.
The objective of the study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the sedation assessment tool (SAT) in assessing patient response to treatment for acute behavioural disturbance (ABD). ⋯ The SAT is a simple, rapid and useful measure of the level of agitation/sedation in patients with ABD. Increases in the score reliably indicated the need for further sedation.
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Debate around medical futility has produced a vast literature that continues to grow. Largely absent from the broader literature is the role of emergency medicine in either starting measures that prove to be futile, withholding treatment or starting the end of life communication process with patients and families. ⋯ We conclude that emergency physicians have the clinical ability and the legal and moral standing to resist providing futile treatment. In these situations they can take a different path that focuses on comfort care thereby initiating the process of the much sought after 'good death'.
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Emerg Med Australas · Oct 2011
Point prevalence of access block and overcrowding in New Zealand emergency departments in 2010 and their relationship to the 'Shorter Stays in ED' target.
To document the extent of access block and ED overcrowding in New Zealand in 2010 and to determine whether these were linked to the hospital's ability to meet the Shorter Stays in ED target. ⋯ Hospital access block was seen more often in larger hospitals and significantly associated with failure to meet the 'Shorter Stays in ED' health target, whereas ED overcrowding was seen in both small and large hospitals, but not associated with failure to meet the target.