Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Short-axis versus long-axis approaches for teaching ultrasound-guided vascular access on a new inanimate model.
To determine whether a short-axis (SA) or long-axis (LA) ultrasound (US) approach to guidance for line placement results in faster vascular access for novice US users. Also, to assess if there was a difference in the number of skin penetrations and needle redirections between the two guidance techniques. ⋯ Novice US users obtain vascular access faster with an SA approach on an inanimate model.
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To determine the frequency and type of patient visits for blood or body fluid exposures to a large, urban emergency department (ED); to ascertain the frequency that human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) was prescribed for these exposures; and to compare HIV PEP usage by patient group, occupation, and exposure type. ⋯ The majority of patients were not HCWs, which attests to the need for national, nonoccupational blood or body fluid management guidelines. There may be particular groups who would benefit from educational campaigns informing them of the need for early-intervention, postexposure measures to prevent an HIV infection.
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Focused assessment with sonography in trauma (FAST) can define life-threatening injuries in austere settings with remote real-time review by experienced physicians. This study evaluates vest-mounted microwave, satellite, and LifeLink communications technology for image clarity and diagnostic accuracy during remote transmission of FAST examinations. ⋯ Accuracy correlated with clarity. Roaming vest transmission of FAST provides interpretable, diagnostic imagery at the distances used in this study. VSAT provided the best clarity and diagnostic value with the lighter, more portable INMARSAT serving a lesser role for remote clinical interpretation. LifeLink performed well, and further infrastructure improvements may increase clarity and accuracy.
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Aggregated emergency department (ED) data are useful for research, ED operations, and public health surveillance. Diagnosis data are widely available as The International Classification of Diseases, version, 9, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) codes; however, there are over 24,000 ICD-9-CM code-descriptor pairs. Standardized groupings (clusters) of ICD-9-CM codes have been developed by other disciplines, including family medicine (FM), internal medicine (IM), inpatient care (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality [AHRQ]), and vital statistics (NCHS). The purpose of this study was to evaluate the coverage of four existing ICD-9-CM cluster systems for emergency medicine. ⋯ The AHRQ system provided the best coverage of ED ICD-9-CM codes. However, most of the clusters were small and not significantly different from the raw data.
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To determine the number of emergency medicine (EM) residency programs in which residents serve as helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) crew, the extent of training provided for this role, and how HEMS residents are evaluated. ⋯ The training of residents for their role as flight physicians is highly variable, considering the amount of air transport time they perform. Direct faculty supervision, proficiency testing, and written feedback are rarely utilized.