Pediatric emergency care
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Pediatric emergency care · Oct 2009
Comparative StudyA comparison of parental and nursing assessments of level of illness or injury in a pediatric emergency department.
The 5-tier Emergency Severity Index (ESI) score is a well-accepted, validated triage tool with good interrater reliability. Parental perception of illness severity has not been compared to ESI score. ⋯ Close agreement exists between parent/guardian and nurse ESI scores, illustrating objectivity in parent/guardian assessments. This study provides a springboard for future studies regarding ED use after educating families on ED triage.
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Pediatric emergency care · Oct 2009
Adolescent input for designing an emergency department-based intervention about emergency contraception: results from an in-depth interview study.
To explore the attitudes of urban, minority adolescent girls about an emergency department (ED)-based intervention to address emergency contraceptive pill (ECP) use. ⋯ Urban, minority adolescent girls are generally supportive of learning about ECP during an ED visit. Preferences about the appropriateness of the intervention related to the type of patient complaint. Because multiple sources and delivery modalities were acceptable, future studies should determine whether tailoring the source and delivery modality to demographic characteristics enhances the uptake of the message.
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Pediatric emergency care · Oct 2009
Multicenter StudyFactors associated with longer emergency department length of stay for children with bronchiolitis : a prospective multicenter study.
Emergency department (ED) length of stay (LOS) is a quality of care measure and, when prolonged, contributes to ED crowding. Bronchiolitis, a common seasonal illness of infants, provides an opportunity to examine factors affecting ED LOS. ⋯ In this prospective multicenter study of children younger than 2 years with bronchiolitis, multiple factors were associated with longer ED LOS. These factors suggest the following steps to help shorten ED LOS: optimizing translation services, improving primary care provider rates, enhancing overnight patient flow, forgoing chest x-rays, and developing evidence-based admission criteria.