Acute medicine
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Therapeutic hypothermia (TH) is now a well established therapy in resuscitation guidelines. We retrospectively analysed our first 18 months' data for all patients who underwent TH for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA), measuring delays incurred during each patient episode, safety, and ICU outcomes. Sixteen patients received TH for OHCA. ⋯ Seven patients survived to hospital discharge with a 6 month Glasgow Outcome Score of 4-5 in 100%. A questionnaire evaluating 30 first responders' familiarity and knowledge of TH demonstrated poor awareness and knowledge, with most viewing it with low priority. TH is a safe and easy to achieve therapy, however in practice there are significant delays in commencing treatment.
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A 49 year old man presented with rapid onset paraparesis, evidence of lower motor neurone features and sensory impairment following a respiratory tract infection. Initially he was treated with intravenous immunoglobulins for suspected Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS). ⋯ The disease progressed with rapid deterioration despite high dose corticosteroids and the patient died 12 days after admission. This case brings several key points to the attention of the acute physician, in particular the need to give serious consideration to the differential diagnosis of cancer in a patient presenting with lower limb weakness.