Advanced units: quality measures in urgency and emergency care.

Objective: To evaluate, through care indicators, the quality of services rendered to patients considered urgency and emergency cases at an advanced emergency care unit.

Methods: We analyzed data from managerial reports of 64,891 medical visits performed in the Emergency Care Unit of the Ibirapuera Unit at Care during the period from June 1st, 2012 through May 31st, 2013. The proposed indicators for the assessment of care were rate of death in the emergency care unit; average length of stay of patients in the unit; rate of unplanned return visits; admission rate for patients screened as level 1 according to the Emergency Severity Index; rate of non-finalized medical consultations; rate of complaints; and door-to-electrocardiogram time.

A program for sustained improvement in preventing ventilator associated pneumonia in an intensive care setting.

Background: Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is a common infection in the intensive care unit (ICU) and associated with a high mortality.

Methods: A quasi-experimental study was conducted in a medical-surgical ICU. Multiple interventions to optimize VAP prevention were performed from October 2008 to December 2010.