Studies in health technology and informatics
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Stud Health Technol Inform · Jan 2006
Emergency medical information system for transferring patients to the medical institute by triage-result.
The Objective of this study was to triage the emergency patients in a pre-hospital stage and transfer them to the appropriate medical institute by the triaged result. For this, considering the pre-hospital emergence situation, we selected the Manchester system as the triage. ⋯ Through this study, the medical institute can be selected based on patient condition. In addition we also can expect the emergency medical institutes to be effectively managed.
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Stud Health Technol Inform · Jan 2006
A Markov model to describe daily changes in organ failure for patients at the ICU.
As the support and stabilization of organ function is a major goal of treatment in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), changes in the function of organ systems are an important indicator of the progression of the disease and recovery. This paper presents how to construct a model that describes changes in organ failure of ICU patients on a day-to-day basis. ⋯ The joint set of equations, extended with equations for predicting ICU discharge and death, constitutes a firstorder multivariate Markov model. We applied the procedure on a dataset and found that most types of organ failure are highly persistent.
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Stud Health Technol Inform · Jan 2006
Developing an interactive approach in teaching medical informatics.
A new masters program in medical informatics is proposed for development at the University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Timisoara. Given the rapidly changing technology itself and its deployment in biomedical science, the master's program curriculum has to be multidisciplinary, comprehensive and coherent in conveying the concepts, as well as the interdisciplinary character, of medical informatics (MI). ⋯ Two teaching teams of four instructors have been assigned to one of two tracks in our pilot study: traditional instruction or interactive instruction. After one term we have gained important information about how the structural and instructional aspects of the pilot design may influence confidence and attitudes.
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This study aims to describe primary care professionals' self-reported attitudes towards evidence-based practice (EBP), attention to information sources, perceptions of the barriers to EBP and strategies to improve insight in EBP and patient care. An e-mail invitation with link to an Internet-based survey was sent to Belgian medical doctors (MDs), nurses and paramedics. Under paramedics, we've included emergency medical technicians, firemen and medical volunteers (Red Cross). ⋯ The most appropriate method for actual implementation of evidence-based practice at all levels of health care is to provide summaries of evidence, easily understandable protocols and web-based databases accessible from the working environment. Students should not only learn the skills related to EBP, but should be able to integrate knowledge effectively in the clinical setting and routine care. Above all, their supervisors themselves need to evolve from 'experience-based' to evidence-based practice'.
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Stud Health Technol Inform · Jan 2006
Brachial plexus palsy associated with halo traction before posterior correction in severe scoliosis.
To retrospectively analyse clinical features and related factors of brachial plexus palsy associated with halo traction before posterior correction in severe scoliosis. ⋯ Brachial plexus palsy associated with halo traction in severe scoliosis is related to the weight of traction, body type and patient-pathology status. If the symptoms are promptly detected with rehabilitation training and appropriate drug treatment adopted, complete nerve functional restoration can be achieved.