Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Increasing human and laboratory evidence suggests that post-resuscitative brain hypothermia reduces the pathologic consequences of brain ischemia. Using a swine model of prolonged cardiac arrest, this investigation sought to determine whether unilateral hypothermic carotid bypass was capable of inducing selective brain hypothermia and reducing neurohistologic damage. ⋯ Post-resuscitative selective brain hypothermia reduced regional ischemic brain damage in swine with prolonged ventricular fibrillation.
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Comparative Study
Faculty triage shortens emergency department length of stay.
To determine whether faculty triage (FT) activities can shorten emergency department (ED) length of stay (LOS). ⋯ Faculty triage offers a moderate increase in efficiency at this ED, albeit with relatively high cost.
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Acute myocardial infarction (AMI) is one of many causes of ST-segment elevation (STE) in emergency department (ED) chest pain (CP) patients. The morphology of STE may assist in the correct determination of its cause, with concave patterns in non-AMI syndromes and non-concave waveforms in AMI. ⋯ A non-concave STE morphology is frequently encountered in AMI patients. While the sensitivity of this pattern for AMI diagnosis is not particularly helpful, the presence of this finding in adult ED chest pain patients with STE strongly suggests AMI. This technique produces consistent results among these EPs.
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To assess the effectiveness of an emergency department (ED)-based strategy to identify and counsel selected patients about the importance of an operational smoke detector in the home and to offer a graded recommendation regarding such a strategy. ⋯ Following the criteria of the graded recommendations used for the parent project. a recommendation cannot be made either for or against an ED-based strategy to counsel patients on the importance of smoke detectors. No studies located in our review directly assessed the effectiveness of such a strategy. Based on the retrospective case series study of the potential opportunity for a home fire safety intervention during an emergency medical services visit and the Safe Block Project study, it may be worthwhile to consider further research on the effectiveness of systems-level/structural interventions, with a targeted focus on strategies that attempt to overcome barriers associated with active interventions.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Droperidol vs. prochlorperazine for benign headaches in the emergency department.
To compare the efficacy of droperidol with that of prochlorperazine for the treatment of benign headaches in emergency department (ED) patients. ⋯ Droperidol was more effective than prochlorperazine in relieving pain associated with benign headaches.