Medical decision making : an international journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making
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Multicenter Study Clinical Trial
The impact of unstable angina guidelines in the triage of emergency department patients with possible acute coronary syndrome.
The primary aim of this study is to determine whether implementing the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR) Unstable Angina Practice Guideline improves emergency physician's decision making in patients with symptoms of possible acute coronary syndrome (ACS), including those for whom the diagnosis of unstable angina is uncertain. ⋯ Implementation of the AHCPR guideline did not improve triage decisions in emergency department patients with possible ACS. Assessing physician triage solely based on concordance with the AHCPR guideline may not accurately reflect the quality of patient care.
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The authors examine which clinical factors contribute to the clinician suspicion of pneumonia, as well as the relationship between clinical factors, clinician suspicion of pneumonia, and ordering chest X-rays (CXR). ⋯ Advanced patient age and physical findings on chest examination influence clinician practice in obtaining CXRs, beyond their contribution to clinician suspicion of pneumonia. Physicians do not appear to endorse recommendations that the diagnosis of community-acquired pneumonia be based on or confirmed by CXR.
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Policy and law encouraging individuals to document their wishes for life-sustaining medical treatment in advance of serious illness assumes that these wishes are unaffected by changes in health condition. To test this assumption, the authors examine the life-sustaining treatment preferences of a sample of elderly adults prior to, soon after, and several months after a hospitalization experience. ⋯ Preferences for life-sustaining treatment are dependent on the context in which they are made, and thus individuals may express different treatment preferences when they are healthy than when they are ill. These results challenge a key psychological assumption underlying the use of instructional advance directives in end-of-life decision making.