Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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The objective was to evaluate the prevalence of limited health literacy and its association with sociodemographic variables in emergency department (ED) patients. ⋯ In this sample, one-quarter of ED patients would be expected to have difficulty understanding health materials and following prescribed treatment regimens. Advanced age and low socioeconomic status were independently associated with limited health literacy. The ability of a significant subgroup of ED patients to understand health information, especially during illness or injury, requires further study.
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Induced hypothermia (HT) after cardiac arrest improved outcomes in randomized trials. Current post-cardiac arrest treatment guidelines advocate HT; however, utilization in practice remains low. One reported barrier to adoption is clinician concern over potential technical difficulty of HT. We hypothesized that using a standardized order set, clinicians could achieve HT target temperature in routine practice with equal or better efficiency than that observed in randomized trials. ⋯ Using a standardized order set, clinicians can achieve HT target temperature in routine practice.
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Burns are characterized by a central zone of necrosis surrounded by a zone of potentially reversible ischemia. The authors explored the contribution of necrosis and apoptosis to cell death in the zone of ischemia. ⋯ Both early apoptosis and delayed necrosis are present in the zone of ischemia, contributing to injury progression. Necrosis appears to play a larger role than apoptosis in injury progression in the comb burn model.
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Academic emergency medicine can benefit by broadening the way in which scholarship is defined to include teaching, integration of knowledge, application of knowledge to practical clinical problems and as discovery of new knowledge. A broad view of scholarship will help foster innovation and may lead to new areas of expertise. The creation of a scholarly environment in emergency medicine faces the continued challenge of an increasing clinical demand. The solution to this dilemma will likely require a mix of clinical staff physicians and academic faculty who are appreciated, nurtured and rewarded in different ways, for the unique contributions they make to the overall success of the academic program.