Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Emergency physicians (EPs) may disagree on when or whether patients need restraints. There is no good objective measure of the likelihood of EPs to restrain patients. ⋯ The VAPERS scale covers a wide range of important variables in emergency situations. It successfully measured likelihood to restrain in this pilot study for overall situations, and for subgroups, based on patient characteristics. A shortened five-video VAPERS also successfully measured the overall likelihood to restrain.
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Studies have only recently begun to investigate the effects of interruptions on physicians in the emergency department (ED). ⋯ Attending emergency physicians frequently interrupt learners during new patient OCPs, with the number of interruptions varying by learner level of training. Teacher interruptions appear to have minimal, if any, detrimental effect on the perceived effectiveness of OCPs as a learning experience.
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To determine if respondents differed by their demography (age group, race or ethnicity, and insurance status) in their tendency to correctly answer knowledge-based questions when they were in an agree-disagree instead of a multiple-choice format. ⋯ This study demonstrated that survey responses are influenced by the format of the questions, particularly in certain demographic groups. Policy makers and researchers might draw false conclusions about the baseline knowledge and need for education of patients, especially in these populations. The use of agree-disagree format questions in preventive health knowledge surveys should be avoided whenever possible.
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To determine the baseline level and evolution of defensive medicine and malpractice concern (MC) of emergency medicine (EM) residents. ⋯ Physicians enter four-year EM residencies in California with moderate MC and defensive medicine, which do not change significantly over time and do not markedly impact their decisions to perform emergency department procedures. Malpractice fear markedly decreases interns' enjoyment of medicine, but this effect decreases by residency completion.
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Supraventricular tachycardia (SVT) is often described as a recurrent condition that leads to emergency department (ED) visits. However, the epidemiology of ED visits for SVT is unknown. ⋯ Supraventricular tachycardia accounts for approximately 50,000 ED visits each year. Higher visit rates in older adults and female patients are consistent with prior studies of SVT in the general population. This study provides an epidemiologic foundation that will enable future research to assess and improve clinical management strategies of SVT in the ED.