Emergency medicine Australasia : EMA
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Emerg Med Australas · May 2024
Cost-effectiveness analysis of an ambulance service-operated specialised cardiac vehicle with mobile extracorporeal cardiopulmonary resuscitation capacity for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in Queensland, Australia.
Extracorporeal CPR (E-CPR) has been primarily limited to the in-hospital setting. A few systems around the world have implemented pre-hospital mobile E-CPR in the form of a dedicated cardiac vehicle fitted with specialised equipment and clinicians required for the performance of E-CPR on-scene. However, evidence of the outcomes and cost-effectiveness of mobile E-CPR remain to be established. We evaluated the cost-effectiveness of a hypothetical mobile E-CPR vehicle operated by Queensland Ambulance Service in the state of Queensland, Australia. ⋯ Pre-hospital E-CPR may be cost-effective. Successful implementation of a pre-hospital E-CPR programme requires substantial planning, training, logistics and operational adjustments.
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Vitamin B17 tablets are sold (online) as an alternative cancer therapy medication. Its use however is not benign, given that it is metabolised into hydrogen cyanide. We aimed to measure the number of calls received by the New South Wales Poisons Information Centre (NSW PIC) regarding Amygdalin exposures. ⋯ There is a significant burden of concern generated from the misuse of cyanogenic glycoside products for cancer prevention and treatment, which can result in hospital admission carrying significant health risk and expenditure.
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Emerg Med Australas · May 2024
Bedside urine testing for fentanyl in self-reported heroin users in a tertiary Brisbane emergency department.
To determine if patients presenting to our toxicology unit following self-reported heroin use had positive urine immunoassay testing for fentanyl or its analogues. ⋯ In patients presenting to our toxicology unit in Brisbane, we did not find any cases where the urine of patients self-reporting heroin exposure tested positive for fentanyl or its analogues.