Annals of emergency medicine
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Interhospital transfers are costly to patients and to the health care system. The use of telemedicine may enable more efficient systems by decreasing transfers or diverting transfers from crowded referral emergency departments (EDs) to alternative appropriate facilities. Our primary objective is to describe the prevalence of telemedicine for transfer coordination among US EDs, the ways in which it is used, and characteristics of EDs that use telemedicine for transfer coordination. ⋯ Although telemedicine has potential to improve efficiency of regional emergency care systems, it is infrequently used for coordination of transfer between EDs. When used, it is most often to assist with clinical care before transfer.
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Review Meta Analysis
Quality Assurance Processes Ensuring Appropriate Follow-up of Test Results Pending at Discharge in Emergency Departments: A Systematic Review.
In many cases, emergency department (ED) care leads to investigations for which there are not final results at patient disposition. The follow-up for these test results pending at discharge, most commonly final diagnostic imaging reports and microbiology cultures, is a significant safety concern for patients and a medicolegal risk for ED practitioners. Our objective is to perform a systematic review of the literature and report on the structure and outcomes of existing ED quality assurance processes to address these test results pending at discharge. ⋯ A variety of quality assurance processes have been described to follow up on ED test results pending at discharge, and we provided recommendations to improve patient care. All ED leaders should consider implementing these according to their local context.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Medication Education for Dosing Safety: A Randomized Controlled Trial.
This study sought to determine whether a brief intervention at the time of emergency department (ED) discharge can improve safe dosing of liquid acetaminophen and ibuprofen by parents or guardians. ⋯ A multifaceted intervention at the time of ED discharge-consisting of a simplified dosing handout, a teaching session, teach-back, and provision of a standardized dosing device-can improve parents' knowledge of safe dosing of liquid medications at 48 to 72 hours.
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Observational Study
Diagnostic Reclassification by a High-Sensitivity Cardiac Troponin Assay.
Our objective is to describe the rates of diagnostic reclassification between conventional cardiac troponin I (cTnI) and high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T (hs-cTnT) and between combined and sex-specific hs-cTnT thresholds in adult emergency department (ED) patients in the United States. ⋯ Compared with conventional cTnI, the hs-cTnT assay resulted in no clinically relevant change in myocardial infarction diagnoses but substantially more myocardial injury diagnoses.