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Too often, ED staff dont report violence due to onerous reporting processes, according to Terry Kowalenko, MD, clinical associate professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at University of Michigan Health System in Ann Arbor. Research suggests that violent incidents occurring in EDs are far more frequent than statistics reveal.1-3
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Pediatric burns, with all of their challenging aspects, are a common injury faced by emergency medicine physicians. Burn injuries are painful for the patient, distressing to the parent, and often raise some difficult questions for the physician in regard to recognition and assessment of non-accidental trauma and the clinical dilemma of disposition. The authors review the current standard for recognition, evaluation, and management of pediatric burn injuries.
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Were you called by the intensive care unit (ICU) because a patient needs emergent intubation due to a dislodged tube or deterioration of the patients status?
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Does a malpractice suit filed by a boarded ED patient allege he or she was being monitored differently in the ED than would have occurred in the intensive care unit (ICU)? In one claim that included this allegation, the ED nurses notes clearly showed that the same standard was followed in the ED.
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If a nurse asks the emergency physician (EP) whether an arterial blood gas (ABG) is needed because a boarded patients pulse oximetry is dropping, a busy EPs response might be to tell the nurse to order the test and let the admitting physician know about it.
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A new peer review and quality improvement process at the University of Michigan Hospital and Health Systems in Ann Arbor methodically samples patient safety indicators in the emergency department (ED) to spot trends that signal problems.
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Malpractice litigation often arises from a psychiatric patient discharged from the ED against medical advice (AMA), according to Robert Berg, JD, an attorney at Epstein Becker Green in Atlanta, GA.
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In Georgia, statutory protections for emergency physicians (EPs) have survived two constitutional challenges.
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Can patients truthfully claim that ED staff ignored their complaints and communicated poorly with one another?
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New data suggest there is a huge opportunity for EDs to identify patients with the hepatitis C virus (HCV) and link them into care before downstream complications lead to higher medical costs and adverse outcomes.
