Annals of emergency medicine
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Emergency department (ED) information systems are designed to support efficient and safe emergency care. These same systems often play a critical role in disasters to facilitate real-time situation awareness, information management, and communication. In this article, we describe one ED's experiences with ED information systems during the April 2013 Boston Marathon bombings. ⋯ Health systems should conduct disaster drills using their ED information systems to identify inefficiencies before an actual incident. ED information systems may require enhancements to better support disasters. Newer technologies, such as radiofrequency identification, could further improve disaster information management and communication but require careful evaluation and implementation into daily ED workflow.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Revisiting the "Golden Hour": An Evaluation of Out-of-Hospital Time in Shock and Traumatic Brain Injury.
We evaluate patients with shock and traumatic brain injury who were previously enrolled in an out-of-hospital clinical trial to test the association between out-of-hospital time and outcome. ⋯ Among out-of-hospital trauma patients meeting physiologic criteria for shock and traumatic brain injury, there was no association between time and outcome. However, the subgroup of shock patients requiring early critical resources and arriving after 60 minutes had higher mortality.
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The recently released HIV Care Continuum Initiative is a cornerstone of the National AIDS Strategy and a model for improving care for those living with HIV. To our knowledge, there are no studies exploring the entirety of the HIV Care Continuum for patients in the emergency department (ED). We determine gaps in the HIV Care Continuum to identify potential opportunities for improved care for HIV-infected ED patients. ⋯ To our knowledge, this study is the first to quantify gaps in HIV care for an ED patient population, with the HIV Care Continuum as a framework. Our findings identified distinct phases (ie, testing, provider awareness of HIV diagnosis, and linkage to care) in which the greatest opportunities for intervention exist, if appropriate resources were allocated. This schema could serve as a model for other indolent treatable diseases frequently observed in EDs, where continuity of care is critical.
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We pilot tested a sociotechnical systems-based instrument that assesses the prevalence and nature of self-care barriers among patients presenting to the emergency department (ED) with acute heart failure. ⋯ An instrument assessing self-care barriers from multiple system sources can be feasibly implemented in the ED. Further research is required to modify the instrument for widespread use and evaluate its implementation across institutions and cultural contexts. Self-care barriers measurement can be one component of broader inquiry into the distributed health-related "work" activity of patients, caregivers, and clinicians.
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Disposition decision for patients with possible acute coronary syndrome in the emergency department (ED) is driven primarily by perception of short-term risks. We sought to evaluate communication between patient and physician about these risks by ascertaining the content of discussions surrounding disposition decision. ⋯ Our survey demonstrates poor communication, with overestimation of both the risks of myocardial infarction and potential benefit of hospital admission. These findings suggest that communication surrounding disposition decisions in chest pain patients may at times be ineffective or misleading.