1. Quality of end-of-life care in the emergency department
- Author
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Guillaume Economos, Pascale Cavalli, Thomas Guérin, Marilene Filbet, and Elise Perceau-Chambard
- Subjects
Medical emergencies. Critical care. Intensive care. First aid ,RC86-88.9 - Abstract
Objective: To assess appropriateness of end-of-life treatments provided to actively dying patients attending the emergency department of a primary care hospital. Methods: Retrospective cohort study of patients who died in the emergency department of a French primary care hospital between January 2014 and January 2017. The deceased were identified through the admissions register. Then, electronic medical records were screened for bio-demographic data, data relative to decisions to withhold or withdraw treatments, to diagnosis and to the care provided. Patients were clustered into two categories, actively dying or non-actively dying, using clinical opinion based on their medical records. Appropriateness of care was appraised following French guidelines. Results: One hundred and forty-six deaths were recorded. Actively dying patients mostly suffered from vascular conditions (29.4%). When compared to the overall sample, they were more likely to have decisions to withhold or withdraw treatments (OR = 5.3 [1.56; 20.7], p-value = 0.003), to have strong opioids (OR = 5.32 [2.1; 13.9], p-value
- Published
- 2019
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