Emergency medicine journal : EMJ
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The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident (FDNPPA) was the world's second largest nuclear power plant accident. At the time that it occurred, internet usage prevalence in Japan was as high as 80%. ⋯ Internet usage was significantly and positively associated with greater health knowledge and more preventive behaviours. The internet is a useful method of distributing information to the general public in emergency situations such as a nuclear disaster.
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In the West Midlands region of the UK, the delivery of prehospital trauma care has recently been remodelled through the introduction of a regionalised major trauma network (MTN). Helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) are integral to the network, providing means of delivering highly skilled specialist teams to scenes of trauma and rapid transfer of patients to major trauma centres. This study reviews the impact of introducing the West Midlands MTN on the operation of one its regional HEMS units. ⋯ Since the introduction of the West Midlands MTN, tasking of HEMS assets appears to be better targeted to cases involving significant injury, and a reduction in mission cancellations has been observed. There is a need for more detailed evaluation of patient outcomes to identify strategies for optimising the utilisation of HEMS assets within the regional network.
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Previous research suggests individuals who suffer from cognitive impairment are less able to vocalise pain than the rest of the cognitively-intact population. This feature of cognitive impairment may be leading to a chronic underdetection of pain as current assessment tools strongly rely on the participation of the patient. To explore inconsistencies in pain management within the acute setting, we conducted a retrospective assessment of 224 patients presenting with fractured neck of femur at a large teaching hospital's accident and emergency (A&E) department between 2 June 2011 and 2 June 2012. ⋯ The cognitively-impaired cohort would also wait on average an hour longer before receiving this initial pain relief. We believe that these differences stem from cognitively-impaired patients being unable to vocalise their pain through traditional assessment methods. This work discusses the potential development or adoption of a tool which can be applied in the acute setting and relies less on vocalisation but more on the objective features of pain, so making it applicable to cognitively-impaired individuals.