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A prospective study comparing angiographic clot burden score and ECG score in 105 patients with PE found no correlation between the two, and neither predictor correlated with 12-month mortality. In a second retrospective study of 33 consecutive patients with massive PE by conventional clinical criteria, there was also no correlation between findings on CT angiography and mortality.
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Valproic acid and phenytoin were equally effective in the treatment of acute repetitive seizures and status epilepticus.
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Forty-four acute care hospitals participated in a prospective study over four years to determine the effect of quality improvement (QI) interventions on appropriate prescribing of surgical antimicrobial prophylaxis. Hospitals were randomly assigned to either feedback on the results of the ongoing audit vs feedback plus an intensive collaborative intervention group. Both groups showed improvement in most quality indicators, but there appeared to be no benefit of the intensive QI collaborative intervention over performance feedback.
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Unfractionated heparin (UFH) is the standard bridging therapy for patients with mechanical heart valves who need to temporarily stop oral anticoagulants. Small case series have suggested that low molecular weight heparin (LMWH) may be useful for this purpose.
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Terminally ill cancer patients who had end-of-life discussions with their physician had better quality of life during their last week, and their caregivers had an easier bereavement.
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You are working one evening, and the EMS dispatch center calls. The ambulance is bringing in a 35-year-old male motor vehicle collision victim who is unresponsive and has a BP of 80 palpable. So, what happens next in your emergency department? Who do you assemble? What equipment do you gather? Do you call the blood bank and the operating room?
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Although the original study by Van den Berghe et al sparked interest in the use of intensive insulin therapy in the ICU, subsequent studies have cast doubt on the efficacy and safety of this practice.
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