Articles: mortality.
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Population health metrics · Feb 2005
Comparing strategies for United States veterans' mortality ascertainment.
We aimed to determine optimal strategies for complete mortality ascertainment comparing death certificates and United States (US) Veterans Administration (VA) records. ⋯ As single sources, VA decedent files and death certificates each provided an incomplete record, and death ascertainment was improved by using both source files. Potential bias may vary depending on analytic interest.
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Frequent emergency department (ED) users are a nebulous group of patients. A high degree of psychiatric problems and higher than expected mortality from medical illness have been reported in this population. ⋯ These data show that there is a high incidence of medical problems in frequent ED users and a high incidence of mortality in patients with heavy ED use.
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Anoxic brain injury is a common outcome after cardiac arrest. Despite substantial research into the pathophysiology and management of this injury, a beneficial treatment modality has not been previously identified. Recent studies show that induced hypothermia reduces mortality and improves neurological outcomes in patients resuscitated from ventricular fibrillation. This article reviews the literature on induced hypothermia for anoxic brain injury and summarizes a treatment algorithm proposed by the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians Critical Care Committee for hypothermia induction in cardiac arrest survivors.
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Mortality in the USA has been shown to spike on Christmas and New Year's Day. No comparable analyses are available for European data despite recognised seasonal mortality variations. ⋯ No disturbance of trend was seen at Easter. The causes of the 'holiday phenomenon' are not understood, but absence of a Christmas spike in NNT may indicate that it is preventable.