Journal of critical care
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Journal of critical care · Jun 2014
Assessment of a modified 4T scoring system for heparin-induced thrombocytopenia in critically ill patients.
The purpose of the study is to determine if a modified 4T (m4T) scoring system, which omits clinical evaluation of other thrombocytopenic etiologies, is different from the 4T scoring system's probability to predict a positive heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) laboratory test in the intensive care unit. ⋯ This study does not show a difference in the probability of the m4T and 4T scoring systems to predict a positive ELISA anti-PF4 Ab test in the critically ill patient population. Further prospective studies are needed to validate the m4T scoring system.
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Journal of critical care · Jun 2014
Randomized Controlled TrialThe effect of the arterial catheter insertion technique on the success of radial artery cannulation: A prospective and randomized study.
The main objective of the current investigation was to compare a single wall puncture to vessel transfixing on the success of radial artery cannulation by resident physicians. ⋯ Our findings suggest that there does not appear to be an advantage of the transfixing technique over the single wall puncture method for cannulating the radial artery by resident physicians. Cannulation was achieved in shorter time using the single wall puncture technique even after accounting for differences between residents and prior levels of experience.
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Journal of critical care · Jun 2014
Observational StudyEvaluation of a dosing regimen for continuous vancomycin infusion in critically ill patients: An observational study in intensive care unit patients.
We aimed to evaluate a dosing algorithm for continuous vancomycin administration in intensive care unit patients. ⋯ The evaluated vancomycin dosing regimen for continuous infusion allowed rapid achievement of sufficient vancomycin serum levels. However, we frequently observed supra-therapeutic serum vancomycin concentrations in the first days of vancomycin treatment.