Quality Improvement Initiative to Increase Rate of and Time to Post-intubation Analgesia in the Emergency Department.

INTRODUCTION: Intubation and mechanical ventilation are common interventions performed in the emergency department (ED). These interventions cause pain and discomfort to patients and necessitate analgesia and sedation. Recent trends in the ED and intensive care unit focus on an analgesia-first model to improve patient outcomes. Initial data from our institution demonstrated an over-emphasis on sedation and an opportunity to improve analgesic administration. As a result of these findings, the ED undertook a quality improvement (QI) project aimed at improving analgesia administration and time to analgesia post-intubation. METHODS: We performed a pre-post study between January 2017-February 2019 in the ED. Patients over the age of 18 who were intubated using rapid sequence intubation (RSI) were included in the study. The primary outcome was the rate of analgesia administration; a secondary outcome was time to analgesia administration. Quality improvement interventions occurred in two phases: an initial intervention focused on nursing education only, and a subsequent intervention that included nursing and physician education. RESULTS: During the study period, 460 patients were intubated in the ED and met inclusion/exclusion criteria. Prior to the first intervention, the average rate of analgesia administration was 57.3%; after the second intervention, the rate was 94.9% (P <0.01). Prior to the first intervention, average time to analgesia administration was 36.0 minutes; after the second intervention, the time was 16.6 minutes (P value <0.01). CONCLUSION: This QI intervention demonstrates the ability of education interventions alone to increase the rate of analgesia administration and reduce the time to analgesia in post-intubation patients.

Do trauma patients with phencyclidine-positive urine drug screens have increased morbidity or mortality?

BACKGROUND: Phencyclidine (PCP) use is anecdotally associated with agitation and injury and is frequently tested for in the setting of trauma. We sought to determine characteristics of trauma patients with a PCP-positive urine immunoassay drug screen (UDS) and if they had increased levels of care or mortality. METHODS: A 5-year retrospective review of a level 1 trauma center's trauma registry identified patients with a PCP-positive UDS. This group was then compared with 2 randomly selected control groups from the same trauma registry which were matched for age and sex but differed in that one had no sEtOH detected and a negative UDS (drug-free group) whereas the other had sEtOH or an other-than-PCP-positive UDS (other-drug group). Subgroup analysis was performed comparing PCP-positive patients with undetectable sEtOH with other-drug patients with undetectable sEtOH. RESULTS: The registry contained 7770 patients of which 156 met inclusion criteria. The mean age was 33.4years (range, 19-63), and 77% were male (n=121). When compared with the other-drug group, the PCP-positive group had significantly lower injury severity score, rates of intensive care unit admission, and sEtOH. No difference was seen in vital signs, mechanism of injury, ventilator days, intensive care unit days, total hospital days, disposition, or mortality between the 3 groups. This remained true even when subgroups with negative sEtOH were compared. CONCLUSION: This study suggests that a PCP-positive UDS in the setting of trauma is not associated with increased level of care, length of stay, or mortality.