Emergency medicine Australasia : EMA
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Emerg Med Australas · Feb 2006
ReviewUse of emergency departments by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
To review published Australian literature about ED care of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. ⋯ Further conclusions of the present literature review were limited by contradictory results in the few studies of reasonable quality and by general concerns about data quality, especially the poor (but slowly improving) identification of Indigenous people in routine ED data sets. Closer collaboration between ED staff and Indigenous hospital liaison staff, combined with regular monitoring of routinely-collected ED data, have the potential to improve Indigenous ED care and so contribute to improvements in Indigenous health.
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Emerg Med Australas · Oct 2005
Factors associated with walkout of patients from New South Wales hospital emergency departments, Australia.
To explore the association between daily patient numbers, sociodemographic, clinical and system characteristics and walkout rates of patients from New South Wales (NSW) public hospital ED (without seeing a medical officer). ⋯ After adjusting for triage category (urgency of presentation) and triage time, patients from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and those without private health insurance coverage were more likely to leave ED without treatment. These results have important implications for Health Services. Future strategies aimed at minimizing walkouts from public hospital ED should prioritize and target factors identified in the present study.
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Emerg Med Australas · Oct 2005
Comparative StudyPrehospital intubation and chest decompression is associated with unexpected survival in major thoracic blunt trauma.
Application of the Trauma and Injury Severity Score (TRISS) to a trauma population identifies patients with 'unexpected survival'. This study used TRISS analysis to identify 'unexpected survivors' suffering major thoracic trauma, who survived to hospital discharge. Further analysis determined prehospital interventions that appeared to contribute to 'unexpected survival'. ⋯ For patients sustaining severe thoracic blunt trauma, prehospital intubation and chest decompression appear to be associated with unexpected survival. A low GCS at scene is not predictive of 'unexpected survival' or 'expected death'.
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Emerg Med Australas · Oct 2005
Historical ArticleProfessional issues in emergency medicine: UK perspective.
The present paper describes the history, the professional development and current state of the specialty of emergency medicine in the UK, and outlines the role of parent bodies that administer the specialty.