Prehospital emergency care : official journal of the National Association of EMS Physicians and the National Association of State EMS Directors
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Comparative Study
A Randomized Comparative Assessment of Three Surgical Cricothyrotomy Devices on Airway Mannequins.
Airway obstruction is the second leading cause of preventable battlefield death, at least in part because surgical cricothyrotomy (SC) failure rates remain unacceptably high. Ideally, SC should be a rapid, simple, easily-learned, and reliably-performed procedure. Currently, 3 SC devices meet Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) standards: The Tactical CricKit® (TCK), Control-CricTM(CC), and Bougie-assisted Technique (BAT). However, no previous studies have compared these devices in application time, application success, user ratings, and user preference. ⋯ While this study was limited by the use of mannequins in a laboratory environment, present results indicate that none of these devices was ideal for performing SC. Based on slow application times, low success rates, and user feedback, the Control-CricTM cannot be recommended until improvements are made to the blade design.
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We report a case of a 56 year old male in ventricular fibrillation (VF) cardiac arrest for a total of 2 hours and 50 minutes who was diagnosed with ST elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) during a brief 10 min period of return of spontaneous circulation (ROSC). The patient underwent successful percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) while receiving mechanical chest compressions for ongoing VF. Our case demonstrates the potential for neurologically intact survival in VF cardiac arrest patients despite prolonged periods of VF who are treated with mechanical CPR and intra-arrest PCI.
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The National Association of EMS Educators, the National EMS Management Association, and the International Association of Flight and Critical Care Paramedics believe the time has come for paramedics to be trained through a formal education process that culminates with an associate degree. Once implemented a degree requirement will improve the care delivered by paramedics and enhance paramedicine as a heath profession.
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An integrated response to active threat events is essential to saving lives. Coordination of law enforcement officer (LEO) and emergency medical services (EMS) roles requires joint training, as maximizing survival is a shared responsibility. We sought to evaluate the performance of an integrated LEO-EMS Rescue Task Force (RTF) response to a simulated active shooter incident utilizing objective performance measures. ⋯ We described the performance of an integrated LEO-EMS Rescue Task Force response to a simulated active shooter event in a large city. In general, clinical care was appropriate while operational targets can be improved. Objective measurement of response goals may be used for benchmarking and performance improvement for active threat events.
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Comparative Study Observational Study
Comparing the Accuracy of Mass Casualty Triage Systems in a Pediatric Population.
It was previously difficult to compare the accuracy of different mass casualty triage systems to one another. This pilot study is one of the first attempts to operationalize an expert panel's criterion standard definitions of triage categories in a pediatric population in order to compare accuracy between different systems. ⋯ We found that the 4 most popular mass casualty triage systems preformed similarly in an emergency department-based pediatric population. None of the systems were extremely accurate, and each demonstrated an unacceptable amount of under-triage. Better differentiating between patients categorized as "minimal" and "delayed" may improve the accuracy of mass casualty triage systems.