Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Multicenter Study
Means to an end: Characteristics and follow-up of emergency department patients with a history of suicide attempt via medication overdose.
Availability and accessibility of a wide range of medications may be a contributing factor to rising medication-related overdose (OD) rates. Treatment for both suicide attempts (SAs) and ODs often occurs in the emergency department (ED), highlighting its potential as a screening and intervention point. The current study aimed to identify sociodemographic and clinical characteristics of individuals who reported SA via medication OD compared to other methods and to examine how these patients' suicide severity and behaviors differed over 12-month post-ED follow-up. ⋯ Among patients presenting to the ED, females, individuals with bipolar disorder, and patients with a college education, respectively, may be at highest risk for SAs via medication OD. Prospectively, medication OD appears to be a frequent method, even among individuals with no prior attempt via OD, as demonstrated by the high percentage of patients who did not have a medication OD at baseline, but reported a medication OD during follow-up.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study
Piroxicam and paracetamol in the prevention of early recurrent pain and emergency department readmission after renal colic: Randomized placebo-controlled trial.
Renal colic (RC) is a common urologic emergency often leading to significant pain and recurrent hospital visits. This study aimed to compare the efficacy and safety of piroxicam versus paracetamol in preventing pain recurrence and hospital readmission in patients treated for RC and discharged from the emergency department (ED). ⋯ Piroxicam and paracetamol did not demonstrate efficacy in preventing pain recurrence or ED readmission within the first week following RC treatment.
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Multicenter Study
Sex-specific high-sensitivity troponin T cut-points have similar safety but lower efficacy than overall cut-points in a multisite U.S. cohort.
Data comparing the performance of sex-specific to overall (non-sex-specific) high-sensitivity cardiac troponin (hs-cTn) cut-points for diagnosing acute coronary syndrome (ACS) are limited. This study aims to compare the safety and efficacy of sex-specific versus overall 99th percentile high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T (hs-cTnT) cut-points. ⋯ Sex-specific hs-cTnT cut-points resulted in fewer patients being ruled out without an improvement in safety compared to the overall cut-point strategy.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study Pragmatic Clinical Trial
Long guidewire peripheral intravenous catheters in emergency departments for management of difficult intravenous access: A multicenter, pragmatic, randomized controlled trial.
A quarter of patients who present to emergency departments (EDs) have difficult intravenous access (DIVA), making it challenging for clinicians to successfully place a peripheral intravenous catheter (PIVC). Some literature suggests that guidewire PIVC improves first-insertion success rate. ⋯ GW-PIVCs had significantly lower first-insertion success and non-significantly higher all-cause catheter failure. Additional training and device design familiar to clinicians are vital factors to enhance the likelihood of successful future implementation of GW-PIVCs.
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Multicenter Study Observational Study
Emergency physician gender and head computed tomography orders for older adults who have fallen.
Physicians vary in their computed tomography (CT) scan usage. It remains unclear how physician gender relates to clinical practice or patient outcomes. The aim of this study was to assess the association between physician gender and decision to order head CT scans for older emergency patients who had fallen. ⋯ There was no significant association between physician gender and ordering head CT scans for older emergency patients who had fallen. For patients where CT scans were ordered, there was no significant relationship between physician gender and the diagnosis of clinically important intracranial bleeding.