Older Adults with Mental Disorders: What Factors Distinguish Those Who Present to Emergency Departments for Mental Health Reasons from Those Who Do Not?

Objective: To identify among older adults with mental disorders factors associated with those who present to emergency departments (EDs) for mental health reasons versus those who do not.

Methods: The authors conducted a secondary, cross-sectional analysis of the Medical Expenditure Panel Survey (MEPS), which comprises a representative sample of the U.S.

Psychiatric emergency services for the U.S. elderly: 2008 and beyond.

In 2011 the oldest baby boomers will turn age 65. Although healthcare researchers have started to examine the future preparedness of the healthcare system for the elderly, psychiatric emergency services (PES) have been widely overlooked. Research is needed to address PES need and demand by older patients, assess the consequences of this need or demand, and establish recommendations to guide PES planning and practice.

A pilot, open-label safety study of quetiapine for treatment of moderate psychotic agitation in the emergency setting.

Objective: The goal of this pilot study was primarily to explore the safety and, secondarily, the efficacy of the use of "prn" quetiapine for treatment of moderate agitation accompanied by psychosis in an emergency department setting.

Methods: This was an open-label study in which 20 patients with psychotic agitation were treated in the emergency department with 100, 150, or 200 mg of quetiapine. Physicians who were unaffiliated with the study established the diagnoses and selected the doses to be used for each patient.

Innovations: Emergency psychiatry: Relative accuracy of breath and serum alcohol readings in the psychiatric emergency service.

Management of changes in physiologic and mental status due to alcohol is a core skill utilized in the psychiatric emergency service. Blood alcohol concentrations are commonly approximated by measuring breath alcohol at triage. However, the blood-breath ratio is highly variable, and breath tests have produced lower readings than blood tests.