BACKGROUND Trauma scores help classify trauma patients, and assist in clinical decision-making. The Revised Trauma Score (RTS) is widely used internationally but its effectiveness as a tool for predicting outcome in paediatric trauma patients in our setting, has yet to be established, mainly owing to lack of use. The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of RTS as a predictor of ...

Patients requiring tracheostomies tend to have a longer length of stay due to their underlying disease. After a thorough literature search, Garrubba and colleagues found only three studies assessing the impact of multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) on tracheostomy patients on the ward. One consistent observation was the decreased time to decannulation after institution of MDT care when compared with...

During the night, on September 2004, Jina called for an ambulance after Sima had trouble breathing and then accompanied her to the hospital. Sima was hospitalized and I came to visit them the next morning at 11:30 am in the ward. After an hour, the nurse entered the room and declared that visiting hours were over. While I prepared to take my things I asked Jina whether she was planning to stay ...

Constipation is a common occurrence on geriatric in-patient wards. It can result in delirium and other complications including bowel obstruction. Over treatment with laxatives can result in iatrogenic diahorrea, which can lead to dehydration, delirium, and the false positive labeling and unnecessary treatment of clostridium difficile carriers. This can result in increased morbidity and mortalit...

AIM To assess the clinical features, length of stay, incidence rate, mortality, and hospital admissions of patients with episodes of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA). PATIENTS It was conducted retrospective, cross-sectional study of 164 consecutive admissions of adult patients (2008-August 2012), with type 1 or type 2 diabetes already known or new onset. RESULTS Mortality rate was 1.2%. The DKA ...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of new sedation management methods and cooperation between nurses and physical therapists on the duration of mechanical ventilation and hospitalization. [Subjects and Methods] Patients who had been treated at the study hospital 2 years before and after the implementation of the new methods were analyzed retrospectively and class...

Results 962 patients. Admitted from emergencies dept. 28%, hospital wards 23,9%, surgical theatre 38,2% (9,3% urgent y 28,9% elective) y 10% from other centres. 38,1% had been admitted to the hospital at least once the previous year and 5,6% in the ICU. Hospital stay previous to ICU admission was 5,9(0,36) days [5,26 (0,32) in survivors, 8,42(1,13) in deaths, p < 0,001]. Total mortality was 23%...

BACKGROUND Limited information is available on the health-care utilization of hospitalized patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) depending on the location of care. Our aim was to compare the clinical characteristics, etiologies, and outcomes of patients with CAP who were admitted to the ICU with those admitted who were to the ward service. METHODS A retrospective cohort study, at t...