BACKGROUND Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST) documents are medical orders intended to honor patient choice in the hospital and prehospital settings. We hypothesized that prehospital personnel will find these forms confusing. OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to determine whether POLST documents accord consensus in determining code status and treatment decisions among e...

A study by Burkle et al. in BMC Anesthesiology examined attitudes around perioperative do-not-resuscitate orders. Questionnaires were given to patients, as well as to anesthesiologists, internists and surgeons. The study has limitations and is open to interpretation. However, the findings are important. There appear to be attitudinal differences between patients and doctors, and between special...

IMPORTANCE After patients survive an in-hospital cardiac arrest, discussions should occur about prognosis and preferences for future resuscitative efforts. OBJECTIVE To assess whether patients' decisions for do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders after a successful resuscitation from in-hospital cardiac arrest are aligned with their expected prognosis. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS Within Get ...

This report addresses the difficult situation in which a patient or surrogate decision maker wishes cardiopulmonary resuscitation to be attempted even though the physician believes that resuscitation efforts would be futile. It also reviews current controversies surrounding the subject of do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders and medical futility, discusses the complex medical, legal, and ethical con...

OBJECTIVES To characterise the incidence and nature of medication errors during paediatric resuscitations. DESIGN A prospective observational study of simulated emergencies. SETTING Emergency department of a tertiary paediatric hospital. PARTICIPANTS Teams that included a clinician who commonly leads "real" resuscitations, at least two assisting physicians, and two or three paediatric nur...

Patients who sustain a cardiac arrest have a less than 20% chance of surviving to hospital discharge. Patients may request do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders if they believe that their chances for a meaningful recovery after cardiopulmonary arrest are low. However, in some identifiable circumstances, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) has a higher chance of success and lower likelihood of neurolo...

I n his paper, which we read with interest, Cherniack argues that there is a worldwide increase in the use of do not resuscitate (DNR) orders in the care of the elderly. As geriatricians in an emergency department and a geriatric department we are concerned by this important ethical topic, and we understand that this increase is a reflection of the demographic increase in frail very old persons...