Articles: intensive-care-units.
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The technical equipment of today's intensive care unit (ICU) workstation has been characterized by a gradual, incremental accumulation of individual devices, whose presence is dictated by patient needs. These devices usually present differently designed controls, operate under different alarm philosophies, and cannot communicate with each other. By contrast, ICU workstations could be equipped permanently and in a standardized manner with electronically linked modules if the attending physicians could reliably predict, at the time of admission, the patient's equipment needs. ⋯ It was found that the equipment need (represented by two different setups, "high tech" and "low tech") could be predicted most reliably (96.4% correct predictions) compared with a prediction on outcome of ICU treatment (94.5%), on duration of artificial ventilation (75.4%), and on duration of stay (43.4%). There was no significant (p greater than 0.05) difference in the reliability of predictions between residents and consultants. Factors influencing the postoperative equipment need varied with surgical specialty.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
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Qual Assur Util Rev · Jan 1992
Quality assessment in the medical intensive care unit. Continued evolution of a data model.
Quality assessment and assurance activities in the intensive care unit are complex processes that begin with the definition of the scope of services delivered in the unit with further identification of the important aspects of care. There is also a need to establish indicators of quality, gather data, and finally to organize the data into useful information. ⋯ In this paper, we focus on the application of the concept of patient days of service for quantification of the utilization of resources as an element of quality. Efficient utilization of resources cannot be effected until data on actual utilization are collected and analyzed.
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Rev Cubana Med Trop · Jan 1992
[The surveillance of nosocomial bacteremia in the Intensive Care Unit of the Hospital Pediátrico Docente Centro Habana].
A prospective study was carried out in order to assess nosocomial bacteremia in the Intensive Care Unit of the Centrohabana Teaching Pediatric Hospital, from January to May 1988. 66.7% of the bacteremia episodes diagnosed were of a nosocomial origin, mostly secondary. Nosocomial bacteremia rate was 15.5 per 100 admissions, with predominance in the age group under 1 year of age. Risk factors for acquiring nosocomial bacteremia were hospital stay longer than 72 hours, age under 1 year, tracheal intubation, deep venous catheterization and urinary catheterization. The most frequently associated microorganisms were Staphylococcus epidermis, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa.
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J Burn Care Rehabil · Jan 1992
Case ReportsBurns are different: the child psychiatrist on the pediatric burns ward.
This article is written from the dual perspective of a child psychiatrist, consultant to a burn unit, who also happens to have suffered burns to his hands and face as the result of a car accident in 1976. One of its central themes is that burns are different from other surgical conditions. The role of the child psychiatrist as a consultant to a pediatric burn unit is explored and illustrated with clinical vignettes.