AACN clinical issues in critical care nursing
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Elderly patients who enter the critical care setting have special nursing care needs based on the physiologic changes of aging. An overview of the changes of aging associated with the immunologic, cardiovascular, integumentary, musculoskeletal, and renal systems provides the basis for care planning to meet the needs of older adults in the intensive care unit.
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Digoxin is frequently prescribed for patients. With a narrow therapeutic window, toxicity can quickly occur. Nurses must quickly recognize dysrhythmias associated with digoxin toxicity to prevent life-threatening situations.
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Wolff-Parkinson-White (WPW) syndrome is a cardiac conduction disorder that presents with potentially life-threatening consequences. Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome-induced dysrhythmias account for 20% of all supraventricular tachycardias that occur in the general population. ⋯ Current diagnostic modalities are accurate in identifying patients with WPW syndrome, but lack the sensitivity to predict sudden cardiac death. This article reviews the history of WPW syndrome, as well as its general characteristics, diagnostic criteria, treatment modalities, and nursing implications.
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Emergency department nursing care of the older individual requires a specific knowledge base to ensure optimal outcomes. Health-care resource utilization specific to elderly patients in the emergency department and selected common health problems that bring older people to the emergency department are described. Distinctions between normal age-related changes and disease signs and symptoms are explained to provide emergency department nurses with the requisite information to care for the elderly appropriately.
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Traumatic brain injury affects approximately 500,000 persons each year. For those patients who survive until they reach the hospital, the major goal of the health care team is to prevent secondary injuries or insults that may follow the initial event and worsen the brain injury. ⋯ Early recognition of these factors and prompt intervention can improve the neurologic outcome of the patient with severe head injury. An understanding of the causes and effects of these secondary insults is critical to the appropriate medical and nursing management of these patients.