The American journal of emergency medicine
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The purpose of this study was to review the emergency department management of children presenting in diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) to determine if current recommendations for fluid therapy are practiced. A 5-year retrospective chart review was conducted of all pediatric patients admitted with DKA to the University of Alberta Hospital. Presenting clinical and laboratory data, the initial fluid therapy, and insulin dose were analyzed. ⋯ This excessive fluid therapy was also evident after 4 hours. Fluid management of children in DKA is excessive and not in keeping with current recommendations. Education of emergency physicians is needed to reduce fluid therapy and the risk of neurologic complications.
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Hyperkalemia is one of the more common acute life-threatening metabolic emergencies seen in the emergency department. Early diagnosis and empiric treatment of hyperkalemia is dependent in many cases on the emergency physician's ability to recognize the electrocardiographic manifestations of hyperkalemia. ⋯ Other "classic" electrocardiographic findings in patients with hyperkalemia include prolongation of the PR interval, flattening or absence of the P-wave, widening of the QRS complex, and a "sine-wave" appearance at severely elevated levels. A thorough knowledge of these findings is imperative for rapid diagnosis and treatment of hyperkalemia.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
Prophylactic metoclopramide is unnecessary with intravenous analgesia in the ED.
Antiemetics are commonly prescribed as prophylaxis for nausea and vomiting when opiate analgesics are prescribed in the emergency department. This prospective, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial assessed the incidence of nausea and vomiting after morphine and pethidine (meperidine) analgesia, and the effect of metoclopramide on this incidence. Intravenous morphine or pethidine analgesia was administered with metoclopramide or placebo to 122 opiate-naïve patients with acute severe pain. ⋯ None of these differences reached statistical significance. The low incidence of nausea and vomiting after opiate analgesia, and higher incidence of side effects with metoclopramide, are consistent with controlled data in the literature. Prophylactic metoclopramide should not be used routinely in ED patients receiving parenteral morphine or pethidine analgesia.
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Clinical trials should use outcomes that are important to patients. We sought to determine the aspects of laceration management that are most important to patients. A prospective observational survey was conducted at one suburban and one urban university ED during November to December 1998 that included ED patients and visitors with and without current or prior lacerations. ⋯ Patients prioritize the medical outcomes of laceration repair (function, avoiding infection, cosmesis, pain) more than cost, compassion, ED length of stay and inconvenience (missed work/school). Cosmetic outcome is particularly important to patients with facial lacerations. This information should be useful when designing outcome studies of laceration management.