False Activation of Cath Lab Associated with Efforts Aimed at Decreasing Door to Balloon Times

From ACEP News:

Recent cuts in the door-to-balloon time for treating patients hospitalized with an acute myocardial infarction came with the cost of increased “false alarm” activations of the hospital’s emergency coronary-catheterization laboratory team.

At the University of Michigan, the rate of coronary-catheterization lab activations that proved unnecessary because patients did not have ST-elevation myocardial infarctions (STEMI) jumped from 23% of all activations in 2007 to 48% in 2011, Dr. Geoffrey D. Barnes and his associates reported in a poster at the annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology.

Gas line explodes north of Maquoketa

From WCF Courier:

A gas line was ruptured, sending flames shooting into the sky, when a tiling plow hit it Friday in a farm field in northern Jackson County.

Joe Kilburg, LaMotte fire chief, said flames went 100 feet into the air after a plow pulled out the gas line at 4:34 p.m. at the Wayne Althoff farm at 25553 216th Ave., about four miles southwest of LaMotte.

Don Kunde, a Preston contractor, was using tractors to put in some tile in a field, Kilburg said. The plow, which goes about 4 feet deep into the ground, hit a 16-inch gas line and the two tractors pulling the plow pulled the gas line out of the ground. The two men driving the tractors escaped without injury.

If it’s not an emergency, pay first

From Hospitals & Health Networks:

Some hospitals are taking a different approach to reducing the use of emergency departments for minor health problems: charging patients who show up for what the hospital considers to be a non- urgent situation with an up-front fee. In 2004, a Houston-area hospital was the first member of the HCA system to charge an up-front ED fee for nonurgent care, according to HCA spokesperson Ed Fishbough. Since then, similar policies have been implemented at 76 of 163 HCA hospitals.

Is It Really an Emergency?

From Hospitals &Health Networks:

When a patient with a sore throat, earache or other minor ailment heads to the emergency department for a cure, there are a raft of consequences every hospital is familiar with: longer waits for patients with more serious conditions, higher costs for the patient and the hospital, and the challenge of treating a patient in a less-than-ideal care setting. While hospitals are required by EMTALA to take care of all comers, leaders at Presbyterian Healthcare Services in New Mexico have been testing an innovative strategy for dealing with non-emergencies in the ED — they screen patients for more serious problems before sending them on their way to a primary care appointment arranged by the hospital.

The first question that comes to mind, of course, is how a program that sends patients out of the ED complies with EMTALA, but hospital leaders say the ED fulfills the screening requirements required by federal law before deciding whether a patient should be directed to primary care.

“We asked all of those questions right off the bat,” Jim Hinton, president and CEO of Presbyterian Healthcare Services, says. “We’re more than satisfied our program meets the letter and spirit of EMTALA.”

Emergency Physicians’ and Nurses’ Attitudes towards Alcohol-Intoxicated Patients

From the Journal of Emergency Medicine:

BACKGROUND: Emergency physicians and nurses are frequently dissatisfied professionally when treating alcohol-intoxicated patients, and have negative attitudes towards this patient population and alcohol rehabilitation.

STUDY OBJECTIVES: The goal of this study is to examine differences in attitudes between emergency physicians and nurses towards alcohol-intoxicated patients.

METHODS: This single-site survey study evaluated emergency physicians’ and nurses’: 1) attitudes of personal professional satisfaction and dissatisfaction when caring for intoxicated patients; 2) attitudes towards the difficulty in caring for alcohol-intoxicated patients; 3) attitudes towards respect of the alcohol-intoxicated patient; 4) attitudes towards the adequacy of training in caring for intoxicated patients; 5) attitudes towards rehabilitation and counseling of alcohol-intoxicated patients.

RESULTS: Physicians were less satisfied and more dissatisfied than nurses when caring for alcohol-intoxicated patients. Physicians found treating alcohol-intoxicated patients more difficult than nurses did. Physicians were more likely to agree that alcohol-intoxicated patients should be treated with respect. Physicians felt more adequately trained than nurses in caring for alcohol-intoxicated patients. Nurses were more likely to believe that alcohol-related rehabilitation is ineffective compared with physicians. Both nurses and physicians refer alcohol-intoxicated patients to rehabilitation to a similar extent.

CONCLUSIONS: Emergency physicians and nurses have similar attitudes but significant differences in the extent of these attitudes towards the care of the alcohol-intoxicated patient.

Study supports allowing family members in ED during critical care

From EurekAlert (press release):

Contrary to what many trauma teams believe, the presence of family members does not impede the care of injured children in the emergency department, according to a study to be presented Saturday, April 28, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Boston.

Professional medical societies, including the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American College of Emergency Physicians, support family presence during resuscitations and invasive procedures. The degree of family member involvement ranges from observation to participation, depending on the comfort level of families and health care providers.

“Despite the many documented family and patient benefits and previous studies that highlight the safe practice of family presence, trauma providers remain hesitant to adopt this practice,” said lead author Karen O’Connell, MD, FAAP, a pediatric emergency medicine attending physician at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C. “A common concern among medical providers is that this practice may hinder patient care, either because parents will actually interfere with treatment or their presence will increase staff stress and thus decrease procedure performance.”

A systematic review of the evidence for telemedicine in burn care

From Burns:

A comprehensive systematic review of telemedicine in burn care was carried out. Studies published between 1993 and 2010 were included. The main outcome measures were the level of evidence, technical feasibility, clinical feasibility, clinical management and cost effectiveness. The search strategy yielded 24 studies, none of which were randomised. There were only five studies with a control group, and in three of these the patients act as their own controls. Four studies performed quantitative cost analysis, and five more provide qualitative cost analysis. All studies demonstrate technical and clinical feasibility. If the significant potentials of telemedicine to assist in the acute triage, management guidance and outpatient care are to be realised, then research needs to be undertaken to provide evidence for such investment.

Scientists Have Found a Way to Regenerate Muscle Tissue After a Heart Attack

From Gizmodo:

There could be a path to a simpler recovery after a heart attack. Duke University Medical Center scientists have discovered a way to turn the scar tissue that forms after cardiac arrest into healthy muscle tissue, which would make a stem cell transplant unnecessary.

To achieve this, researchers introduced microRNA to scar tissue cells in a living mouse. These hardened cells, called fibroblasts, develop as a result of a heart attack, and impede the organ’s ability to pump blood. The microRNAs, which are molecules that govern the activity of several genes, were able to manipulate the fibroblasts to transform into cells that looked like cardiomyocytes, which comprise heart muscle.

Cities health care plans give incentives for using urgent cares instead of ERs

From the Middleton Journal:

Cities are encouraging employees to help them manage their health care dollars by incentivizing the use of urgent care facilities over visits to the emergency room, a move which can save tax dollars.

Recent data from the American Hospital Association shows that in 2010 there were 554 emergency room visits per 1,000 people in Ohio. It was the sixth-highest rate in the nation and 34 percent higher than the national average.

Employees of two of Butler County’s most populated cities – Hamilton and Middletown – have taken such measures.

In Hamilton, Finance Director Peg Bradner Hancock said the health care costs across all funds totaled more than $7.7 million for its more than 500 employees eligible for these benefits.

High use of ER care costly

From the Middleton Journal:

Ohioans are increasingly turning to hospital emergency departments for their health care, a costly trend some say is symptomatic of a disjointed approach to care that ails the U.S. health care system.

In Ohio, there were 554 visits per 1,000 people to hospital emergency departments in 2010, the most recent year for which the American Hospital Association has data. That was up from 449 visits per 1,000 people in 2002, and was the sixth highest rate in the nation — 34 percent higher than the U.S. average.

And the gap has widened. In 2002, Ohio’s per-capita emergency department utilization was 18 percent higher than the U.S. average.