Caring touch as a bodily anchor for patients after sustaining a motor vehicle accident with minor or no physical injuries - a mixed methods study.

Background: Patients who sustain a motor vehicle accident may experience long-term distress, even if they are uninjured or only slightly injured. There is a risk of neglecting patients with minor or no physical injuries, which might impact future health problems. The aim of this study was to explore patients' subjective experiences and perspectives on pain and other factors of importance after an early nursing intervention consisting of "caring touch" (tactile massage and healing touch) for patients subjected to a motor vehicle accident with minor or no physical injuries.

["Active health management" can provide support for vulnerable patients. New model for the prevention of unplanned healthcare].

A small group of frequent emergency department visitors account for a disproportionally large fraction of health care consumption, including unplanned hospitalizations and overall healthcare costs. In response, case and disease management programs aimed at reducing health care consumption in this group have been tested, however results vary widely. In this study, we aimed to investigate if a telephone-based, nurse led case management intervention can reduce health care consumption for frequent emergency department visitors in a large-scale set-up.

A case management intervention targeted to reduce healthcare consumption for frequent Emergency Department visitors: results from an adaptive randomized trial.

Background: A small group of frequent visitors to Emergency Departments accounts for a disproportionally large fraction of healthcare consumption including unplanned hospitalizations and overall healthcare costs. In response, several case and disease management programs aimed at reducing healthcare consumption in this group have been tested; however, results vary widely.

Objectives: To investigate whether a telephone-based, nurse-led case management intervention can reduce healthcare consumption for frequent Emergency Department visitors in a large-scale setup.

Tactile Massage as Part of the Caring Act: A Qualitative Study in Short-Term Emergency Wards.

Aims And Objectives: The aim of this study was to illuminate the nursing staff's lived experiences and meaning in giving tactile massage (TM) while caring for patients in short-term emergency ward.

Method: Data were collected through individual qualitative interviews with six nurses and eight assistant nurses working with TM in short-term emergency wards in two hospitals in Sweden. The narratives were analyzed using a phenomenological hermeneutical method.

Patient-centered handovers between hospital and primary health care: an assessment of medical records.

Background: Handovers between hospital and primary healthcare possess a risk for patient care. It has been suggested that the exchange of a comprehensive medical record containing both medical and patient-centered aspects of information can support high quality handovers.

Objective: The objective of this study was to explore patient handovers between primary and secondary care by assessing the levels of patient-centeredness of medical records used for communication between care settings and by assessing continuity of patient care.

Improving patient discharge and reducing hospital readmissions by using Intervention Mapping.

Background: There is a growing impetus to reorganize the hospital discharge process to reduce avoidable readmissions and costs. The aim of this study was to provide insight into hospital discharge problems and underlying causes, and to give an overview of solutions that guide providers and policy-makers in improving hospital discharge.

Methods: The Intervention Mapping framework was used.

Nonstructural Safety of Hospitals for Disasters: A Comparison Between Two Capital Cities.

Objective: Hospitals are expected to function as a safe environment during disasters, but many become unusable because of nonstructural damage. This study compares the nonstructural safety of hospitals to disasters in Tehran and Stockholm.

Methods: Hospital safety in Tehran and Stockholm was assessed between September 24, 2012, and April 5, 2013, with use of the nonstructural module of the hospital safety index from the World Health Organization.

Hospital disaster preparedness as measured by functional capacity: a comparison between Iran and Sweden.

Introduction: Hospitals are expected to continue to provide medical care during disasters. However, they often fail to function under these circumstances. Vulnerability to disasters has been shown to be related to the socioeconomic level of a country.

Renal function estimations and dose recommendations for dabigatran, gabapentin and valaciclovir: a data simulation study focused on the elderly.

Objectives: The thrombin inhibitor dabigatran is mainly excreted by the kidneys. We investigated whether the recommended method for estimation of renal function used in the clinical trials, the Cockcroft-Gault (CGold) equation and the estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) modification of diet in renal disease equation 4 (MDRD4), differ in elderly participants, resulting in erroneously higher dose recommendations of dabigatran, which might explain the serious, even fatal, bleeding reported. The renally excreted drugs gabapentin and valaciclovir were also included for comparison.

The key actor: a qualitative study of patient participation in the handover process in Europe.

Background: Patient safety experts have postulated that increasing patient participation in communications during patient handovers will improve the quality of patient transitions, and that this may reduce hospital readmissions. Choosing strategies that enhance patient safety through improved handovers requires better understanding of patient experiences and preferences for participation.

Objective: The aim of this paper is to explore the patients' experiences and perspectives related to the handovers between their primary care providers and the inpatient hospital.

Beliefs and experiences can influence patient participation in handover between primary and secondary care--a qualitative study of patient perspectives.

Background: Communication between healthcare settings at patient transfers between primary and secondary care, 'handover', is a critical and risky process for patients. Patients' views on their roles in these processes are often lacking despite the knowledge that patient participation contributes to enhanced safety and wellbeing.

Objective: This study aims to improve the knowledge and understanding of patients' perspectives about their participation in handover.

A telephone-based case-management intervention reduces healthcare utilization for frequent emergency department visitors.

Background: A small group of frequent visitors to emergency departments accounts for a disproportional large number of total emergency department visits. Previous interventions in this population have shown mixed results.

Objective: To determine whether a nurse-managed telephone-based case-management intervention can reduce healthcare utilization and improve self-assessed health status in frequent emergency department users.

Hospital Incident Command System (HICS) performance in Iran; decision making during disasters.

Background: Hospitals are cornerstones for health care in a community and must continue to function in the face of a disaster. The Hospital Incident Command System (HICS) is a method by which the hospital operates when an emergency is declared. Hospitals are often ill equipped to evaluate the strengths and vulnerabilities of their own management systems before the occurrence of an actual disaster.

International perspectives on emergency department crowding.

The maturation of emergency medicine (EM) as a specialty has coincided with dramatic increases in emergency department (ED) visit rates, both in the United States and around the world. ED crowding has become a public health problem where periodic supply and demand mismatches in ED and hospital resources cause long waiting times and delays in critical treatments. ED crowding has been associated with several negative clinical outcomes, including higher complication rates and mortality.

Tactile massage and hypnosis as a health promotion for nurses in emergency care--a qualitative study.

Background: This study explores nursing personnel's experiences and perceptions of receiving tactile massage and hypnosis during a personnel health promotion project. Nursing in a short term emergency ward environment can be emotionally and physically exhausting due to the stressful work environment and the high dependency patient care. A health promotion project integrating tactile massage and hypnosis with conventional physical activities was therefore introduced for nursing personnel working in this setting at a large university hospital in Sweden.

Asia tsunami disaster 2004: experience at three international airports.

Introduction: On 26 December 2004, a large earthquake in the Indian Ocean and the resulting tsunami created a disaster on a scale unprecedented in recorded history. Thousands of foreign tourists, predominantly Europeans, were affected. Their governments were required to organize rapid rescue responses for a catastrophe thousands of miles away, something for which they had little or no experience.

Facilitators and obstacles in pre-hospital medical response to earthquakes: a qualitative study.

Background: Earthquakes are renowned as being amongst the most dangerous and destructive types of natural disasters. Iran, a developing country in Asia, is prone to earthquakes and is ranked as one of the most vulnerable countries in the world in this respect. The medical response in disasters is accompanied by managerial, logistic, technical, and medical challenges being also the case in the Bam earthquake in Iran.

A fundamental, national, medical disaster management plan: an education-based model.

During disasters, especially following earthquakes, health systems are expected to play an essential role in reducing mortality and morbidity. The most significant naturally occurring disaster in Iran is earthquakes; they have killed >180,000 people in the last 90 years. According to the current plan in 2007, the disaster management system of Iran is composed of three main work groups: (1) Prevention and risk management, (2) Education, and (3) Operation.

Adverse drug reactions and impaired renal function in elderly patients admitted to the emergency department: a retrospective study.

Background: Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) are common in elderly patients. There are various reasons for this, including age- and disease-related alterations in pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics as well as the common practice of polypharmacy. The decline in renal function in elderly patients may also predispose them to pharmacological ADRs (type A, augmented).

Is information sharing between the emergency department and primary care useful to the care of frequent emergency department users?

Objectives: To assess whether easy access to medical information of the emergency department's (ED) frequent users would be useful to patient care in the ED and at primary healthcare centres (PHCs), and if resource utilization in the following year would be affected.

Methods: During a 6-month period, frequent users presenting to the ED of Karolinska University Hospital Huddinge, Sweden, were randomized by the electronic database system into an intervention (n=834) or control group (n=965), the definition being three or more visits in 12 months before the index visit. Printout case notes, from the intervention patients' last three visits, were made accessible to the ED physicians and optionally forwarded to the patient's PHC physician.

Adverse drug reactions causing hospitalization can be monitored from computerized medical records and thereby indicate the quality of drug utilization.

Purpose: To use computerized medical records to study the frequency of adverse drug reactions (ADR) as a cause for acute admission to a university hospital.

Methods: Computerized medical records in 168 consecutively acutely admitted cases to a short-term internal medicine ward at a university hospital were retrospectively evaluated to see if an ADR could have caused the admission.

Results: In 18 cases (11%), an ADR was judged to be the reason for acute admission to the hospital.