Articles: pandemics.
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Pandemic-era social and political tensions may have accelerated pre-existing trends in gun owner diversification and shifts toward protection from people as a primary reason for gun ownership. Specific ownership motivations may shape storage behaviors, use patterns, policy support, and perceptions of safety. This study's objective was to assess the importance of specific reasons for owning guns, including protection from whom and in what circumstances, among demographic subgroups of new and prior gun owners. ⋯ Concurrent, strongly held motivations may produce ambivalence or resistance to public health messaging that narrowly focuses on preventing violent firearm-related injury. Permissive firearm policies may compound behavioral ambivalence, exacerbating conditions that threaten collective safety and civic expression. These conditions call for more nuanced, multidimensional, societal efforts to assure collective safety.
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J. Cardiothorac. Vasc. Anesth. · Nov 2024
Quo Vadis, ECMO? Multidisciplinary Hybrid Extra Corporeal Membrane Oxygenation Rounds During the COVID-19 Pandemic.
The complex care of patients on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) requires a high level of collaboration between multiple medical specialties and allied health professionals. Effective and timely communication between team members is imperative in ensuring patient safety. The COVID-19 pandemic posed unique challenges in the care of patients on ECMO. ⋯ After eight months of rounds, medical care team members were asked to provide feedback regarding the rounds format, strengths, and weaknesses. The most frequently identified strengths were improved multidisciplinary communication and continuity of care. This article demonstrates that hybrid virtual and in-person patient rounds are a feasible way for ECMO programs to improve team communication and overall patient care.
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The COVID-19 pandemic social distancing requirements encouraged patients to avoid public spaces including in-office health care visits. Ambulatory-care-sensitive conditions (ACSCs) represent conditions that can be managed with quality primary care and when access is limited, these conditions can lead to avoidable emergency department (ED) visits. ⋯ This rise in ACSC ED use is consistent with a delay in normal primary care during the pandemic.
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Decreased severe respiratory illness was observed during the first 2 years of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a relatively smaller decrease among children with medical complexity (CMC) compared to non-CMC. We extended this analysis to the third pandemic year (April 1, 2022, to March 31, 2023) when pandemic public health measures were loosened. ⋯ Increased intensive care unit admissions for respiratory illness were also observed (CMC: RR, 1.44; 95% CI, 1.31-1.59; non-CMC: RR, 2.02; 95% CI, 1.89-2.16). Understanding respiratory surge drivers may provide insights to protect at-risk children from respiratory morbidity.
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Because of concerns about provider contamination during tracheostomy procedures in a pandemic such as COVID-19, it is essential to objectively evaluate aerosol generation in all tracheostomy approaches, including newly developed tracheostomy procedures. We performed open surgical tracheostomy (OST), conventional percutaneous tracheostomy (CPT), and novel percutaneous tracheostomy (NPT), a modification of CPT designed to reduce contamination spread, in pig models and then compared the degree of contamination to providers using Glo Germ (Glo Germ, Moab, UT, USA). ⋯ Our results suggest that OST causes significantly less aerosol contamination to providers than either CPT or NPT.