Articles: emergency-department.
-
Comparative Study Observational Study
Characteristics of youth seeking emergency care for assault injuries.
To characterize youth seeking care for assault injuries, the context of violence, and previous emergency department (ED) service utilization to inform ED-based injury prevention. ⋯ Assault-injured youth seeking ED care report higher levels of previous violence, weapon experience, and substance use compared with a comparison group seeking care for other complaints. Almost 10% of assault-injured youth had another fight-related ED visit in the previous year, and ~5% had an ED visit for mental health. Most fights were with people known to them and for well-defined reasons, and were therefore likely preventable. The ED is a critical time to interact with youth to prevent future morbidity.
-
Eur. J. Intern. Med. · Jan 2014
Risk factors associated with adverse drug events among older adults in emergency department.
Little is known about the emergency department (ED) visits from drug-related injury among older adults in Taiwan. This study seeks to identify risk factors associated with adverse drug events (ADEs) leading to ED visits. ⋯ This study suggests that prevention efforts should be focused on older patients with renal insufficiency and polypharmacy who are using high risk medications such as anticoagulants, diuretics, cardiovascular agents, analgesics, and anti-diabetic agents.
-
A short-cut review was carried out to establish whether the pulmonary embolism rule-out criteria (PERC) can safely exclude the diagnosis of pulmonary embolism (PE) in the emergency department (ED). One recent systematic review was directly relevant to the question and incorporated all the other relevant evidence identified. The author, date and country of publication, patient group studied, study type, relevant outcomes, results and study weaknesses of these papers are shown in table 3. The clinical bottom line is that PERC may be safely applied to patients aged 18-49 years presenting to the ED with chest pain and/or dyspnoea providing that the pre-test probability of PE is 7% or less (equivalent to a Wells score of <2).
-
Clinical biochemistry · Jan 2014
Elevated serum ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase-L1 levels in patients with carbon monoxide poisoning.
Ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase-L1 (UCH-L1) has been established as a reliable and potential biomarker of neuronal damage after acute neurologic insults, such as ischemic stroke, subarachnoid hemorrhage, and traumatic brain injury. However, the effect of serum UCH-L1 levels has not been investigated in carbon monoxide (CO)-poisoned patients. The aim of the present study was to evaluate whether serum UCH-L1 levels are a reliable marker of brain damage and the association of UCH-L1 with outcome. ⋯ Serum levels of UCH-L1 appear to have potential clinical utility in providing valuable information about poisoning severity and outcome after CO poisoning.
-
Observational Study
Medication errors in psychiatric patients boarded in the emergency department.
Patients boarded in the emergency department (ED) with psychiatric complaints may be at risk for medication errors. However, no studies exist to characterize the types of errors and risk factors for errors in these patients. ⋯ Psychiatric patients boarded in the ED commonly have medication errors that require intervention.