The Journal of neuroscience nursing : journal of the American Association of Neuroscience Nurses
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Effective management of brain-injured patients requires that nurses have a specialized body of knowledge relating to the pathophysiology and treatment of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Current research in this area has focused on the cascade of secondary injury which leads to the irreversible tissue damage following TBI. Such processes involve excitatory amino acids, neurotransmitters, ion changes, lipid peroxidation, oxygen free radicals, opioids, lactic acidosis and magnesium to name but a few. Given that no accepted treatment paradigm exists to attenuate these secondary processes, nurses may have to autonomously devise individual care plans based on their current understanding of brain injury pathophysiology.
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Transporting patients from the protective environment of the intensive care (ICU) unit to other areas of the hospital has become increasingly common since high technologic testing has become an integral part of health care assessment. The hazards of moving critically ill patients by ambulance or air transport are well recognized and standards of care have been developed based on delineation of these risks. Despite the existing evidence of hazards of interhospital hospital transport, less attention has been given to the potential hazards associated with the intrahospital transport of critically ill patients. ⋯ Results indicate that while the majority of patients experienced some physiologic responses as a result of transport, the responses were not of sufficient magnitude to be classified as a deleterious. Twenty-three technical mishaps, which included inadvertent ventilator and electrocardiogram disconnects, power failures, interruption of medication administration and disconnection of drainage devices were observed. Factors related to these occurrences of technical mishaps were the number of intravenous solutions and infusion pumps and the time spent outside of the ICU environment.