Society for Academic Emergency Medicine
Some 1,900 attendees, including emergency physicians, nurses, medical students, faculty members and researchers from the United States and overseas met May 16-19 in Chicago for the annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine.
"We felt the meeting was well-attended and well-received by attendees, and at a high level," said Barbara Mulder, the society's interim executive director, whose staff organized the meeting. "From comments we received, the overall evaluations of the meeting were extremely positive."
New research presented at the meeting included emergency department overcrowding, the physical impact of Tasers, HIV-testing in the emergency room and a report finding that most physicians don't vote, according to Debra Houry, M.D., M.P.H., of Emory University in Atlanta, the meeting's program committee chair.
There was a plenary session led by Jeff Kline, M.D., of Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, N.C., on a multi-center validation of a diagnostic tool for pulmonary embolism.
Due to the fear of malpractice, many patients are given computed tomography scans to detect pulmonary embolism, but over 90 percent of these tests are negative, Kline reported. Instead, Kline said a set of simple criteria, the Pulmonary Embolism Rule-Out Criteria, can eliminate these unneeded tests.
"Physicians now believe more than ever that every patient with any hint of a life-threatening illness should have the most expensive, most technological 'standard-of-care' diagnostic test ordered to rule out that illness," Kline said in a statement. "This multi-center collaborative project shows that we can use a careful history and physical examination to achieve the same degree of certainty without the cost and side-effects of diagnostic testing."
Researchers also gave preliminary results of a study showing that Taser exposure has no lasting ill effects on healthy people. Gary Vilke, M.D., of the University of California, San Diego Medical Center, and colleagues analyzed the effects of a single five-second exposure to a Taser X26, a model used by more than one-third of police agencies, and found no clinically measurable consequences.
Another study suggested that physician voter turnout is low and has been dropping in recent years. Jennifer Lee, M.D., and Melissa McCarthy, Sc.D., of Johns Hopkins Medical School, used U.S. Census data to compare voter turnout among doctors with other professionals.
The researchers found that only about one-quarter of physicians said they had voted in the last presidential election, and physicians were far less likely to vote than lawyers, who had the highest turnout. In fact, physician voting was on a par with waiters, drivers and laborers, the report indicated.
Researchers at the annual meeting also reported that routine HIV testing in the emergency department is widely accepted by patients as well as cost-effective. More studies focused on the behavior of health care workers during disasters, and the extent to which emergency departments are used for primary care.
"They also discussed the need for a coordinated response to disasters," Houry explained. "Because right now, there's no national coordination for emergency medical services -- it's all state or locally based."
During a session moderated by Arthur Kellermann, M.D., M.P.H., chairman of emergency medicine at Emory University, discussion focused on an Institute of Medicine report that recommended strategies to reduce overcrowding in emergency facilities. The report also discussed problems involved in the delivery of emergency services to children. "There aren't enough hospitals that can care for children," Houry said.
SAEM: Air Bag More Harm Than Help in Tall, Short People
FRIDAY, May 18 (HealthDay News) -- Although air bags may help protect front-seat vehicle occupants of medium stature from serious injuries during a crash, they may actually harm occupants of short or tall stature, particularly if they are in the passenger seat, according to research presented this week at the annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine in Chicago.
SAEM: Risky Driving May Be on the Rise in Young Females
THURSDAY, May 17 (HealthDay News) -- Among teens and young adults, females are less likely than males to practice risky behaviors that lead to fatal crashes, such as drinking and driving and not wearing seat belts. But the gender gap may be closing, according to research presented this week at the annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine in Chicago.
SAEM: Factors Affect Workers' Desire to Work in Disaster
THURSDAY, May 17 (HealthDay News) -- Among health care workers, an important predictor of willingness and ability to report to work in the case of a disaster is an assurance that their efforts will be effective, according to research presented this week at the annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine in Chicago.
