Project to get transplant organs from ER patients raises ethics questions

From the Washington Post:

In the hope of expanding a controversial form of organ donation into emergency rooms around the United States, a federally funded project has begun trying to obtain kidneys, livers and possibly other body parts from car-accident victims, heart-attack fatalities and other urgent-care patients.

Using a $321,000 grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, the emergency departments at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center-Presbyterian Hospital and Allegheny General Hospital in Pittsburgh have started rapidly identifying donors among patients whom doctors are unable to save and taking steps to preserve their organs so a transplant team can rush to try to retrieve them.

Theraputic Hypothermia and Hospitalists

From Today’s Hospitalist:

So why is hypothermia available in only a minority of hospitals? Physicians who have established cooling services say there are a number of start-up hurdles that need to be cleared.

Then there are logistical issues to be hammered out. Should local hospitals try to establish these services, for instance, or would centralized hypothermia centers be a better way to go, similar to the model often used for stroke centers? And for hospitals that take the plunge and offer hypothermia, should the therapy be the turf of specialists or generalists?

The answers to those questions will help determine not only how quickly hypothermia services are adopted, but the role of hospitalists in caring for patients who have been resuscitated and cooled.

“Spice” Incense Smoked, Leading to ED Visit

From LocalNews8:

Cache County health officials say at least six people have been treated in the emergency room for stomach pain after smoking incense that’s being used as a drug.

The substance is commonly known as “spice.” It resembles dried cannabis and is legal to sell, but is marketed as incense.

Substance abuse experts say the material is composed of mostly synthetic ingredients that have widely unknown effects.