Annals of emergency medicine
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Multicenter Study
Risk factors for stroke and thromboprophylaxis in atrial fibrillation: what happens in daily clinical practice? The GEFAUR-1 study.
We determine the risk for stroke of patients with atrial fibrillation in the emergency department (ED) and analyze the use of stroke prophylaxis in this setting. ⋯ Most patients seen in the ED with atrial fibrillation are at high risk of stroke. Despite this risk, anticoagulation is underused in this setting, mainly because of the influence of advanced age on medical decisions and the reluctance to change current antiplatelet therapy.
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Multicenter Study
Electrical cardioversion of emergency department patients with atrial fibrillation.
Electrical cardioversion of emergency department (ED) patients with atrial fibrillation has not been well investigated. The objective of this study is to identify the outcomes and complications associated with ED electrical cardioversion of patients with atrial fibrillation. ⋯ In this multicenter cohort, selected ED patients with atrial fibrillation had high rates of electrical cardioversion success, infrequent hospital admission, and few immediate and short-term complications.
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Multicenter Study
Defining "therapeutically inconsequential" head computed tomographic findings in patients with blunt head trauma.
Many injuries detected by computed tomographic (CT) imaging of blunt head trauma patients are considered "therapeutically inconsequential." We estimate the prevalence of these findings and determine how frequently affected patients had "important neurosurgical outcomes," defined as either a directed intervention or a poor Glasgow Outcome Scale score. ⋯ "Therapeutically inconsequential" findings are identified in less than 2% of blunt head trauma patients who undergo CT scanning. A small proportion of these patients have an "important neurosurgical outcome," but it appears that such patients may be identified clinically by the presence of abnormal mental status or coagulopathy.