Emergency medicine journal : EMJ
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Emergency medicine (EM) consultants are expected to provide leadership to facilitate optimal clinical results, effective teamwork and learning. To foster leadership skills, the Emergency Medicine Leadership Programme (EMLeaders) was launched in 2018 by the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), Health Education England and National Health Service England. A mixed-methods evaluation of EMLeaders was commissioned to assess the impact at the strategic, team and individual levels. This paper reports the qualitative evaluation component. ⋯ The development of leadership skills in EM is considered important. The EMLeaders programme can support leadership learning but further embedding is needed.
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A short systematic review was undertaken to assess whether adult patients presenting to the ED with a first seizure require a CT head scan to rule out emergent intracranial pathology. MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane and Google Scholar databases were searched. ⋯ Our results indicate that adults presenting with a first seizure are a high-yield group for CT with a number needed to scan (NNS) between 10 and 19 for findings that would change management in ED, such as haemorrhage, infarction and tumours. We believe that this NNS is sufficiently low to justify the routine use of neuroimaging for these patients in emergency care.
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Multicenter Study Observational Study
Frailty is associated with 30-day mortality: a multicentre study of Swedish emergency departments.
Older patients living with frailty have an increased risk for adverse events. The Clinical Frailty Scale (CFS) is a 9-point frailty assessment instrument that has shown promise to identify frail emergency department (ED) patients at increased risk of adverse outcomes. The aim of this study was to investigate the association between CFS scores and 30-day mortality in an ED setting when assessments are made by regular ED staff. ⋯ Patients living with frailty, had significantly higher mortality and admission rates as well as longer ED and in-hospital LOS compared with robust patients. The results confirm the capability of the CFS to risk stratify short-term mortality in older ED patients.