Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Multicenter Study Comparative Study
Comparison of adverse events during procedural sedation between specially trained pediatric residents and pediatric emergency physicians in Israel.
The aim was to compare the rate of procedural sedation-related adverse events of pediatric residents with specific training in "patient safety during sedation" and pediatric emergency physicians (PEPs) who completed the same course or were teaching faculty for it. ⋯ Unsupervised pediatric residents with training in patient safety during sedation performed procedural sedations with a rate of adverse events similar to that of PEPs.
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Multicenter Study
Race, ethnicity, and management of pain from long-bone fractures: a prospective study of two academic urban emergency departments.
The objective was to test the hypothesis that African American and Hispanic patients are less likely to receive analgesics than white patients in two academic urban emergency departments (EDs). ⋯ Receipt of analgesics for pain from long-bone fractures was not associated with patient race or ethnicity in two academic urban EDs.
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Multicenter Study
The Six-Item Screener to detect cognitive impairment in older emergency department patients.
Cognitive impairment due to delirium or dementia is common in older emergency department (ED) patients. To prevent errors, emergency physicians (EPs) should use brief, sensitive tests to evaluate older patient's mental status. Prior studies have shown that the Six-Item Screener (SIS) meets these criteria. ⋯ The sensitivity of the SIS was lower than in prior studies. The reasons for this lower sensitivity are unclear. Further study is needed to clarify the ideal brief mental status test for ED use.
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Multicenter Study
Children with bacterial meningitis presenting to the emergency department during the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine era.
The epidemiology of bacterial meningitis in children in the era of widespread heptavalent conjugate pneumococcal vaccination (PCV7) is unknown. ⋯ Although now a rare infectious disease in United States, bacterial meningitis still causes substantial morbidity in affected children. Despite the introduction of PCV7, S. pneumoniae remains the most common cause of bacterial meningitis in U.S. children, with approximately half of cases due to nonvaccine serotypes.
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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.