Integrating New Staff into Endovascular Stroke-Treatment Workflows in the COVID-19 Pandemic.

A health care crisis such as the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic requires allocation of hospital staff and resources on short notice. Thus, new and sometimes less experienced team members might join the team to fill in the gaps. This scenario can be particularly challenging in endovascular stroke treatment, which is a highly specialized task that requires seamless cooperation of numerous health care workers across various specialties and professions. This document is intended for stroke teams who face the challenge of integrating new team members into endovascular stroke-treatment workflows during the COVID-19 pandemic or any other global health care emergency. It discusses the key strategies for smooth integration of new stroke-team members in a crisis situation: 1) transfer of key knowledge (simple take-home messages), 2) open communication and a nonjudgmental atmosphere, 3) strategic task assignment, and 4) graded learning and responsibility. While these 4 key principles should generally be followed in endovascular stroke treatment, they become even more important during health care emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic, when health care professionals have to take on new and additional roles and responsibilities in challenging working environments for which they were not specifically trained.

Venous Thromboembolism Prophylaxis in Neurocritical Care Patients: Are Current Practices, Best Practices?

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a leading cause of preventable, in-hospital deaths; critically ill patients have a higher risk. Effective and efficient strategies to prevent VTE exist; however, neurocritical care patients present unique challenges due to competing risk of bleeding. The objective of this study was to examine current VTE prophylaxis practices among neurocritical care patients, concordance with guideline-recommended care, and the association with clinical outcomes. METHODS: This retrospective cohort study of patients admitted to ten adult, medical-surgical and neurological intensive care units (ICUs) in nine hospitals between 2014 and 2017 using administrative and clinical data. Neurocritical care patients were classified based on the primary admission diagnosis. Concordance with guideline-recommended care was evaluated using recommendations from recent guidelines. RESULTS: 20.0% of 23,191 patients were classified as neurocritical care. Among neurocritical care patients, pharmacological VTE prophylaxis was administered on 60.9% of all ICU days, mechanical VTE prophylaxis on 46.9%, and no VTE prophylaxis on 12.2% of all ICU days. Type of VTE prophylaxis was associated with sex, neurological diagnosis, and invasive neurological monitoring. Fifty-six percentage of ICU days were guideline concordant but concordance varied by recommendation (range 6-100%) and by type of VTE prophylaxis recommended (p = 0.05); among patients where guidelines recommended use of pharmacologic prophylaxis, care was concordant 26.6% of ICU days, whereas for mechanical prophylaxis it was concordant 80.5% of ICU days. There was an overall improvement in guideline concordance on 2.3% of ICU days after the publication of the Society of Neurocritical Care guideline (p = 0.005). CONCLUSIONS: Neurocritical care patients commonly receive mechanical VTE prophylaxis despite guidelines recommending the use of pharmacological VTE prophylaxis. Our findings suggest uncertainty around best VTE prophylaxis practices for neurocritical care patients remains.

Rescue extracorporeal membrane oxygenation therapy in methamphetamine toxicity.

Complications related to methamphetamine use and abuse are common presentations seen in the emergency department. Standard management focuses on addressing the central nervous system and cardiovascular effects with the use of sedation and hemodynamic support. We describe a case report of a patient with methamphetamine toxicity and subsequent severe cardiomyopathy refractory to conventional management that responded to cardiovascular support with extracorporeal membrane oxygenation therapy (ECMO). A 22-year-old female was admitted in severe cardiogenic shock following intravenous administration of methamphetamine and oral fentanyl use. Despite aggressive treatment with benzodiazepines, intravenous fluids, vasopressors, vasodilators, antibiotics and inotropes, the patient's clinical status deteriorated, and she suffered a cardiac arrest. The patient was successfully resuscitated, and following the return of spontaneous circulation, ECMO was initiated. After 82 hours the patient was successfully weaned from ECMO with the recovery of her left ventricular function and no neurologic sequelae. The patient developed leg ischemia requiring embolectomy and open repair as a complication of ECMO cannulation. In our case, ECMO was used successfully in treating severe cardiac dysfunction from acute methamphetamine-induced cardiomyopathy and was used as a bridge to recovery. The complications seen in this patient emphasize the potential risks associated with this intervention and highlight the need for careful patient selection.