Emergency Medicine - Adult and Pediatric
RSSArticles
-
New Approaches for Ethically Challenging ED Cases
For emergency providers, time is precious. If a full-blown consult is not possible, ethicists can help discern the most critical aspect of a concern these clinicians may express. Quick, in-person responses; phone consults; and telemedicine consults all are possible approaches.
-
Communicate Collaboratively Before End-of-Life Care Conversations Disintegrate
Once communication breaks down, it is difficult to rebuild. Clinicians, ethicists, and palliative care all should be talking to each other to be sure the family hears a common message.
-
Families Are Confused, Skeptical About ‘Inappropriate’ Treatment
Many, if not most, ethics consults involve conflicts over withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment at the end of a patient’s life. Yet families are likely to be quite confused by commonly used terms such as “futile” and “potentially inappropriate.”
-
Veterans with PTSD, TBI at Much Higher Risk for Heart Attack
Such patients also more likely to experience first attack at a younger age than the general population.
-
American Heart Association Calls for End to Structural Racism
Group “declares its unequivocal support of antiracist principles” in a recent presidential advisory.
-
Fever in the Returning Pediatric Traveler
Although, currently, there are travel restrictions in many countries, this will pass. Acute care physicians need to have an awareness of diseases that are prevalent in other countries to accurately diagnose, manage, and treat patients traveling to and from other parts of the world. The authors present an incredibly valuable synopsis of fever and differential of fever in returning pediatric travelers
-
Length of Time in ED Linked to Patient Safety Events
The odds of a patient safety event (defined as a near-miss event or adverse event) increase by 4.5% for every additional hour a patient stays in the ED, according to the authors of a recent study.
-
Hospitals Mistakenly View Boarding as an ‘ED Problem’
Since hospitals rely on elective surgeries for financial viability, patients admitted from the ED tend to be a somewhat lower priority. Asking hospital administrators to observe the risks of ED boarding firsthand can help change this perception.
-
Report Links ED Boarding to Worse Clinical Outcomes
Some hospitals have found a novel solution in the form of resuscitative care units, which are ICUs based in EDs. Patients who need time-sensitive respiratory, metabolic, neurologic, or hemodynamic critical care can receive it in the ED. This prevents these patients from waiting so long for a bed to finally open in the appropriate specialty ICU.
-
Angry Encounters Can Adversely Affect Clinical Decision-Making
A patient screams and spits at the emergency physician and nurse who are trying to determine if a life-threatening emergency exists. Another patient is extremely grateful, cooperative, and respectful. Assuming both patients presented with the exact same clinical situation, would ED providers treat them any differently? The authors of two recent studies examined this interesting question.