Emergency medicine journal : EMJ
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Limb injuries are common at music festival sites and traditionally patients seen by on-site medical services require referral to hospital emergency departments for radiographic exclusion of bony injury. This takes clinical personnel off site, increases demand on local emergency departments and is inconvenient for revellers. This is an audit of the use of a portable digital radiography system at the Virgin music festival in Staffordshire over a 3-year period.
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Severe pain is a common presenting symptom for emergency patients. One major challenge in the management of severe pain is the objective measurement of pain. Due to the subjective nature of pain, it can be very difficult for clinicians to quantify pain intensity and measure the qualitative features of the pain experience. ⋯ This paper reviews the characteristics required of a prehospital acute pain measure and appraises the relative utility of a number of currently used pain measures. At present, the verbal numerical rating scale appears the most appropriate pain measure to administer in the prehospital setting for adult patients as it is practical and valid. Either the Oucher scale or the faces pain scale is suitable for prehospital care providers to assess pain in children.
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Multicenter Study Comparative Study
Comparing methods of detecting alcohol-related emergency department presentations.
To assess the strengths and limitations of different methods for detecting alcohol-related emergency department (ED) presentations and to compare the characteristics of patients who present to the ED with an alcohol-related presentation with ED patients who are found to be risky drinkers by a questionnaire. ⋯ Not all patients with an alcohol-related ED presentation usually drink at risky levels, nor do all risky drinkers present to the ED for an alcohol-related reason. The use of routinely recorded nursing triage text detects over a third of alcohol-related ED presentations with no additional burden on busy clinicians. As these data are potentially readily accessible, further research is needed to evaluate their validity for the detection of alcohol-related ED presentations.
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Multicenter Study Comparative Study
Observer agreement of the Manchester Triage System and the Emergency Severity Index: a simulation study.