Military medicine
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To demonstrate the broad utility of the remotely supervised transcranial direct current stimulation (RS-tDCS) protocol developed to deliver at-home rehabilitation for individuals with multiple sclerosis (MS). ⋯ RS-tDCS is feasible and tolerable for MS participants. The RS-tDCS protocol can be used to reach those in locations without clinic access and be paired with training or rehabilitation in locations away from the clinic. This protocol could be used to deliver tDCS paired with training or rehabilitation activities remotely to service members and veterans.
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The role of the Emergency Medicine (EM) physician in the U.S. military continues to expand, and current Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education general training requirements do not optimally prepare military EM graduates to be successful in postresidency operational assignments. To address this gap, the Naval Medical Center San Diego EM residency program introduced a Military Unique Curriculum (MUC) culminating in a capstone event, the Joint Emergency Medicine Exercise (JEMX). ⋯ An integrated MUC with a capstone exercise, such as our JEMX, provides a feasible and effective educational experience that improves operational readiness of graduating EM residents.
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Contextual factors (eg, diagnostic suggestion and burnout) can affect physician clinical reasoning performance, leading to diagnostic error. Yet, contextual factors have only recently been studied and none of that work focused on how physicians appraise (ie, evaluate) the clinical situation as they reason. The purpose of this qualitative study was to use appraisal to describe the effect of contextual factors on clinical reasoning. ⋯ This study suggests that one major effect of contextual factors may be that they induce emotions, which may affect the process of clinical reasoning and diagnostic error. It also suggests that uncertainty may be common in clinical practice, and we should thus further explore its impact.
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Military personnel and civilian athletes are both at risk for mild traumatic brain injury. However, these groups are unique in their training and typical daily activities. A fundamental gap in the evaluation of military personnel following mild traumatic brain injury is the lack of military-specific normative reference data. This project aimed to determine if a separate normative sample should be used for military personnel on their performance of the Cleveland Clinic Concussion application and a recently developed dual-task module. ⋯ Differences in cognitive performance and postural stability measures may be influenced by demographic differences between military and civilian cohorts. Thus, military-specific normative datasets must be established to optimize clinical interpretation of Cleveland Clinic Concussion assessments.
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This study aimed to identify delays of care due to base access security protocols at a stateside military medical treatment facility (MTF) for patients with a time-sensitive medical condition who are seeking emergency medical care at the MTF. ⋯ We identify the potential for patient harm due to delays in care resulting from the security protocols at our MTF. A review of force protection requirements with consideration for their impact on patient safety, especially in cases of time-sensitive conditions, has been conducted.