Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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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 evaluate the prevalence, distribution, and demographics of thoracolumbar (TL) spine injuries following blunt trauma. ⋯ The prevalence of TL injuries in ED blunt trauma patients undergoing TL radiographs is 6.3%. The most commonly injured area of the TL spine is the thoracolumbar junction.
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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.