Academic emergency medicine : official journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
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Untreated hypertension (HTN) is a major public health problem. Screening for untreated HTN in the emergency department (ED) may lead to appropriate treatment of more patients. The authors investigated the accuracy of identifying HTN in the ED, the proportion of ED patients with untreated HTN, patient characteristics predicting untreated HTN, and provider documentation of untreated HTN. ⋯ Untreated HTN was common in the ED but rarely documented. Providers can use ED blood pressures along with patient characteristics to identify those with untreated HTN for referral to primary care.
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Recently, investigators described a clinical decision rule for termination of resuscitation (TOR) designed to help determine whether to terminate emergency medical services (EMS) resuscitative efforts for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests (OOHCA). The authors sought to evaluate the hypothesis that TOR would predict no survival for patients in an independent cohort of patients with OOHCA. ⋯ The authors evaluated TOR guidelines in an independent, statewide OOHCA database. The results are consistent with the findings of the TOR investigation and suggest that this algorithm is a promising tool for TOR decision-making in the field.
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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.
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The objective was to assess productivity of previous recipients of Society for Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) grant awards. ⋯ Previous recipients of the SAEM grant awards show evidence of academic productivity in the form of subsequent grant funding and research publications, and the majority remain committed to and satisfied with their academic research careers.