Feasibility of the Transport PLUS intervention to improve the transitions of care for patients transported home by ambulance: a non-randomized pilot study.

Background: The growing population of patients over the age of 65 faces particular vulnerability following discharge after hospitalization or an emergency room visit. Specific areas of concern include a high risk for falls and poor comprehension of discharge instructions. Emergency medical technicians (EMTs), who frequently transport these patients home from the hospital, are uniquely positioned to aid in mitigating transition of care risks and are both trained and utilized to do so using the Transport PLUS intervention.

Can emergency medical dispatch codes predict prehospital interventions for common 9-1-1 call types?

Objective: The Medical Priority Dispatch System is an emergency medical dispatch (EMD) system that is widely used to categorize 9-1-1 calls and optimize resource allocation. This study evaluates the ability of EMD and non-EMD codes (calls not processed by EMD) to predict prehospital use of medications and procedures.

Methods: All transported prehospital patients placed in an EMD or non-EMD category that exceeded 500 total calls from January 1, 2004, to December 31, 2006, in a suburban California county were matched with their prehospital electronic patient care record.

When are prehospital intravenous catheters used for treatment?

Prior studies have found that > 50% of prehospital intravenous catheters (i.v.s) were unutilized for treatment; however, few data are available regarding which patients benefit.

Women are less likely than men to receive prehospital analgesia for isolated extremity injuries.

Objectives: The goal of this study was to examine the effect of socioeconomic factors, such as ethnicity, income, age, and sex, on the administration of analgesia for isolated extremity injuries in the prehospital setting.

Methods: For this retrospective study, the electronic medical record of a large ground-based emergency medical services agency was reviewed and all isolated extremity injuries occurring during the year 2005 were extracted. A total of 1009 cases met the inclusion criteria.

The ability of emergency medical dispatch codes of medical complaints to predict ALS prehospital interventions.

Objective: The Medical Priority Dispatch System (MPDS) is an emergency medical dispatch (EMD) system that is commonly used to triage 9-1-1 calls and optimize paramedic and EMT dispatch. The objective of this study was to determine the sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values of selected MPDS dispatch codes to predict the need for ALS medication or procedures.

Methods: Patients with selected MPDS codes between November 1, 2003, and October 31, 2005, from a suburban California county were matched with their electronic patient care record.