Articles: emergency-services.
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Multicenter Study Comparative Study
Unscheduled Care Access in the United States-A Tale of Two Emergency Departments.
Rural communities face challenges in accessing healthcare services due to physician shortages and limited unscheduled care capabilities in office settings. As a result, rural hospital-based Emergency Departments (ED) may disproportionately provide acute, unscheduled care needs. We sought to examine differences in ED utilization and the relative role of the ED in providing access to unscheduled care between rural and urban communities. ⋯ The use and role of EDs by Medicare beneficiaries appears to be substantially different between urban and rural areas. This suggests that the ED may play a distinct role within the healthcare delivery system of rural communities that face disproportionate barriers to care access.
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Multicenter Study
Diagnosed and Undiagnosed COVID-19 in US Emergency Department Health Care Personnel: A Cross-sectional Analysis.
We determine the percentage of diagnosed and undiagnosed severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection among a sample of US emergency department (ED) health care personnel before July 2020. ⋯ In late spring and early summer 2020, the estimated prevalence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection was 4.6%, and greater than one third of infections were undiagnosed. Undiagnosed SARS-CoV-2 infection may pose substantial risk for transmission to other staff and patients.
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Multicenter Study
Does pain severity predict stone characteristics or outcomes in emergency department patients with acute renal colic?
After initial emergency department (ED) management of acute renal colic, recurrent or ongoing severe pain is the usual pathway to ED revisits, hospitalizations and rescue interventions. If index visit pain severity is associated with stone size or with subsequent failure of conservative management, then it might be useful in identifying patients who would benefit from early definitive imaging or intervention. Our objectives were to determine whether pain severity correlates with stone size, and to evaluate its utility in predicting important outcomes. ⋯ Pain severity is not helpful in predicting stone size or renal colic outcomes. More severe pain does not indicate a larger stone or a worse prognosis.
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Multicenter Study
Use of the BIG score to predict mortality in pediatric trauma.
The BIG score, which is comprised of admission base deficit (B), International Normalized Ratio (I), and GCS (G), is a severity of illness score that can be used to rapidly predict in-hospital mortality in pediatric patients presenting following traumatic injury. We sought to compare the mortality prediction of the pediatric trauma BIG score with other well-established pediatric trauma severity of illness scores: the pediatric logistic organ dysfunction (PELOD); the pediatric index of mortality 2 (PIM2); and the pediatric risk of mortality (PRISM III). ⋯ In this massive cohort of pediatric trauma patients, the BIG score using imputation of missing variables performed similarly to the PELOD, PIM2, and PRISM III, further validating the score as a predictor of mortality.
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Multicenter Study
Association between patient-physician gender concordance and patient experience scores. Is there gender bias?
Patient satisfaction, a commonly measured indicator of quality of care and patient experience, is often used in physician performance reviews and promotion decisions. Patient satisfaction surveys may introduce gender-related bias. ⋯ Female patients prefer female emergency physicians but were less satisfied with their physician and emergency department visit overall. Over-representation of female patients on patient satisfaction surveys introduces bias. Patient satisfaction surveys should be deemphasized from physician compensation and promotion decisions.