Patient Extrication Process for Urban Emergency Departments.

Objectives: This project aimed to create and implement a safe and efficient role-based process to rapidly extricate traumatically injured persons transported to the emergency department via police transport or private vehicle.

Methods: A simulation exercise was conducted with an interdisciplinary team of ED personnel, Philadelphia Police Department, and University of Pennsylvania police officers to identify the necessary steps to rapidly extricate traumatically injured individuals.

Results: The simulation exercise identified several new processes needed to complete rapid extrications of traumatically injured individuals from private and police vehicles.

[Peripheral neuropathy with autonomous nervous system involvement in the course of dermatomyositis].

A peripheral neuropathy occurs rarely during the course of an inflammatory myopathy. Once the classical aetiologies of peripheral neuropathies are ruled out, the diagnosis of neuromyositis can be accepted. We report a patient with dermatomyositis who presented a peripheral neuropathy revealed by dysautonomia.

Droperidol and ondansetron in vitro electrophysiological drug interaction study.

Droperidol and ondansetron are potent anti-emetic agents which are often administered together. Although both drugs prolong QT interval in man by inhibition of Human Ether-a-go-go Related Gene-coded potassium channels, only droperidol was tested using more integrated experimental models. Therefore, we studied the effects of both compounds and their combination on action potentials (AP) of rabbit Purkinje fibers using conventional intracellular glass microelectrode.

sigma(2)-receptor ligand-mediated inhibition of inwardly rectifying K(+) channels in the heart.

The sigma(2)-receptor agonist, ifenprodil, was suggested as an inhibitor of G protein-coupled inwardly rectifying potassium channels. Nevertheless, an analysis of the role of sigma(2) receptors in cardiac electrophysiology has never been done. This work aims i) to identify the roles of cardiac sigma(2) receptors in the regulation of cardiac K(+) channel conductances and ii) to check whether sigma(2)-receptor agonists exhibit class III antiarrhythmic properties.