The American journal of emergency medicine
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N95 respirator masks may not provide adequate protection during chest compressions, even when resuscitators have passed quantitative fit testing.
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There is an increasing focus in the emergency department (ED) on addressing the needs of persons with cognitive impairment, most of whom have multiple chronic conditions. We investigated which common comorbidities among multimorbid persons with cognitive impairment conferred increased risk for ED treat and release utilization. ⋯ These results show that multimorbid cognitively impaired older adults with depression or osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis are at higher risk of ED treat and release visits. Future ED research with multimorbid cognitively impaired persons may explore behavioral aspects of depression and/or pain and flairs associated with osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis, as well as the role of informal caregivers in the care of these conditions.
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Automated surveillance for cardiac arrests would be useful in overcrowded emergency departments. The purpose of this study is to develop and test artificial neural network (ANN) classifiers for early detection of patients at risk of cardiac arrest in emergency departments. ⋯ The ANN improves upon MEWS and conventional machine learning algorithms for the prediction of cardiac arrests in emergency departments. The hybrid ANN model utilizing both baseline and sequence information achieved the best performance.
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Observational Study
Factors associated with first-pass success of emergency endotracheal intubation.
Endotracheal intubation is frequently performed in emergency departments (EDs). First-pass success is important because repeated attempts are associated with poor outcomes. We sought to identify factors associated with first-pass success in emergency endotracheal intubation. ⋯ Operator characteristics, including clinical experience and working department, and patient characteristics, including restricted mouth opening, restricted neck extension and swollen tongue, were independent predictors of first-pass success in emergency endotracheal intubation.