Emergency medicine journal : EMJ
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A short-cut review was carried out to establish whether ultrasound or plain radiography is a more sensitive diagnostic modality for slipped capital femoral epiphysis. Three studies were directly relevant to the question. The author, date and country of publication, patient group studied, study type, relevant outcomes, results and study weaknesses of these papers are shown in table 2. The clinical bottom line is that ultrasonography is more sensitive then radiography for diagnosing slipped capital femoral epiphysis based on the results of small studies.
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Head injuries across all age groups represent an extremely common emergency department (ED) presentation. The main focus of initial assessment and management rightly concentrates on the need to exclude significant pathology, that may or may not require neurosurgical intervention. Relatively little focus, however, is given to the potential for development of post-concussion syndrome (PCS), a constellation of symptoms of varying severity, which may bear little correlation to the nature or magnitude of the precipitating insult. This review aims to clarify the aetiology and terminology surrounding PCS and to examine the mechanisms for diagnosing and treating.
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To investigate the clinical characteristics and outcomes of adults with occult bacteraemia and the clinical impact of appropriate antibiotics. ⋯ For adults with occult bacteraemia, a lower severity of illness and death rate than those of bacteraemic patients hospitalised for ED visit could be demonstrated, demonstrating the importance of appropriate antibiotic therapy.
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Comparative Study
Emergency medical admissions, deaths at weekends and the public holiday effect. Cohort study.
To assess whether mortality of patients admitted on weekends and public holidays was higher in a district general hospital whose consultants are present more than 6 h per day on the acute medical unit with no other fixed clinical commitments. ⋯ Patients admitted as emergencies to medicine on public holidays had significantly higher mortality at 7 and 30 days compared with patients admitted on other days of the week.