Search

Introduction: Appropriate and efficient staffing is a cornerstone of emergency centre performance. There is however a paucity of literature describing clinician output in low- and middle-income countries with current staffing models based on anecdotal evidence. This study aimed to assess clinician output at a district level emergency centre, and how it varied depending on shift, clinician, and workload factors. Methods: We conducted a retrospective cross-sectional study using an existing electronic patient registry, to determine the patients consulted per hour (PPH) during each clinician shift and how this is affected by various clinician, shift, and workload factors. Data was collected over three non-contiguous randomly selected four-week cycles from Mitchells Plain Hospital's electronic patient registry. Associations between PPH and various factors were assessed using ANOVA with post-hoc adjustments where appropriate. The correlation between PPH and workload metrics was calculated with the Pearson's Rank correlation test. Statistical significance was defined as p

Introduction: De novo (new) guideline development methods are well described and supported by numerous examples, including comprehensive checklists. However, alternative guideline development methods, which draw from existing up to date, high quality clinical practice guidelines instead of re-inventing the wheel, have not been adopted so readily, despite the potential efficiencies of such methods compared to de novo development. In Africa, guideline quality and rigour of development, especially for prehospital care, remains poor. This paper firstly describes the opinions of international guideline experts on the African Federation for Emergency Medicine guideline project, and secondly updates a framework for South African prehospital guideline development. Methods: We conducted a qualitative study of expert reviews of an evidence-based guideline development project led by the African Federation for Emergency Medicine in 2016 for prehospital care in South Africa. We purposefully sampled key international and regional guideline experts from a range of organisations. Comments and voice memos, following a terms of reference guide, were thematically analysed through manual coding. Results: A total of seven experts gave feedback. Key themes revolved around existing international clinical practice guidelines not being enough to cover context specific evidence, blurring of guideline responsibilities and output, and transparency of guideline decisions and conflicts of interest. We showcase three fit-for-purpose guideline development approaches and provide an updated alternative guideline development roadmap for low-resource settings. Conclusion: In order to create clinical practice guidelines that clinicians trust and use on a daily basis to change lives, guideline developers need rigorous yet pragmatic approaches that are responsive to end-user needs. Reflecting on the African Federation for Emergency Medicine prehospital guideline development project in 2016, this paper presents key guiding themes to strengthen guideline development in low- and middle-income countries and other low-resource settings and provides an updated hybrid guideline development approach.

Introduction: Prehospital care is integral in addressing sub-Saharan Africa's (SSA) high injury and illness burden. Consequently, robust, high-quality prehospital guidance documents are needed to inform care. These guidance documents include, but are not limited to, clinical practice guidelines (CPGs), protocols and algorithms that are contextually appropriate for SSA. However, SSA prehospital guidance mostly originates from the ‘Global North,’ with limited guidance for Africa by Africans. To strengthen prehospital clinical practice in SSA, we described and appraised all prehospital SSA guidance documents informing clinical decision making. Methods: We conducted a scoping review of prehospital-relevant guidance documents, including CPGs, algorithms, protocols and position statements originating from SSA. We performed a comprehensive literature search in various databases (PUBMED and SCOPUS), guideline clearing houses (Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network, Trip, and Guidelines International Network), journals, various forms of grey literature and contacted experts. Guidance document screening and data extraction was done independently, in duplicate and reviewed by a third author. Guidance quality was then determined using the AGREE II tool and data were analysed using simple descriptive statistics. Results: We included 51 guidance documents from 13 countries across SSA after screening 2320 potential documents. The majority of guidance documents lacked an evidence foundation, made recommendations based on expert input, and were predominantly end-user presentations such as algorithms or protocols. Overall, reporting quality was poor, specifically for critical domains such as rigour of development; however, clarity of presentation was generally strong. Guidance topics were focused around resuscitation and common diseases (both communicable and non-communicable) with major gaps identified across a variety of topics; such as mental health for example. Conclusion: The majority of prehospital clinical guidance from SSA provides clinicians with excellent ready to use end-user material. Conversely, most of the guidance documents lack an appropriate evidence foundation and fail to transparently report the guidance development process, highlighting the need to strengthen and build guideline development capacity to promote the transition from eminence-based to evidence-based guidance for prehospital care in SSA. Guideline developers, professional societies and publishers need to be aware of international and local guidance document development and reporting standards in order to produce guidance we can trust.

Introduction: Trauma scoring systems are widely used in emergency settings to guide clinical decisions and to predict mortality. It remains unclear which system is most suitable to use for patients with gunshot injuries at district-level hospitals. This study compares the Triage Early Warning Score (TEWS), Injury Severity Score (ISS), Trauma and Injury Severity Score (TRISS), Kampala Trauma Score (KTS) and Revised Trauma Score (RTS) as predictors of mortality among patients with gunshot injuries at a district-level urban public hospital in Cape Town, South Africa. Methods: Gunshot-related patients admitted to the resuscitation area of Khayelitsha Hospital between 1 January 2016 and 31 December 2017 were retrospectively analysed. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis were used to determine the accuracy of each score to predict all-cause in-hospital mortality. The odds ratio (with 95% confidence intervals) was used as a measure of association. Results: In total, 331 patients were included in analysing the different scores (abstracted from database n = 431, excluded: missing files n = 16, non gunshot injury n = 10,

Introduction: An adaptive guideline development method, as opposed to a de novo guideline development, is dependent on access to existing high-quality up-to-date clinical practice guidelines (CPGs). We described the characteristics and quality of CPGs relevant to prehospital care worldwide, in order to strengthen guideline development in low-resource settings for emergency care. Methods: We conducted a descriptive study of a database of international CPGs relevant to emergency care produced by the African Federation for Emergency Medicine (AFEM) CPG project in 2016. Guideline quality was assessed with the AGREE II tool, independently and in duplicate. End-user documents such as protocols, care pathways, and algorithms were excluded. Data were imported, managed, and analysed in STATA 14 and R. Results: In total, 276 guidelines were included. Less than 2% of CPGs originated from low- and middle income-countries (LMICs); only 15% (n = 38) of guidelines were prehospital specific, and there were no CPGs directly applicable to prehospital care in LMICs. Most guidelines used de novo methods (58%, n = 150) and were produced by professional societies or associations (63%, n = 164), with the minority developed by international bodies (3%, n = 7). National bodies, such as the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN), produced higher quality guidelines when compared to international guidelines, professional societies, and clinician/academic-produced guidelines. Guideline quality varied across topics, subpopulations and producers. Resource-constrained guideline developers that cannot afford de novo guideline development have access to an expanding pool of high-quality prehospital guidelines to translate to their local setting. Discussion: Although some high-quality CPGs exist relevant to emergency care, none directly address the needs of prehospital care in LMICs, especially in Africa. Strengthening guideline development capacity, including adaptive guideline development methods that use existing high-quality CPGs, is a priority. Keywords: Emergency care, Prehospital, Guideline development, Scoping, Guideline quality

Introduction: Emergency Medical Services are ideally placed to provide relief of acute pain and discomfort. The objectives of this study were to describe pre-hospital pain management practices by Emergency Medical Services in the Western Cape, South Africa. Methods: A retrospective, descriptive survey was undertaken of analgesic drug administration by advanced life support paramedics. Patient care records generated in the City of Cape Town during an 11-month period containing administrations of morphine, ketamine, nitrates and 50% nitrous oxide/oxygen were randomly sampled. Variables studied were drug dose, dose frequency, and route of administration, patient age, gender, disorder and call type as well as qualification and experience level of the provider. Results: A total of 530 patient care records were included (n = 530). Morphine was administered in 371 (70%, 95% CI 66–74) cases, nitrates in 197 (37%, 95% CI 33–41) and ketamine in 9 (1.7%, 95% CI 1–3) cases. A total of 5 mg or less of morphine was administered in 278 (75%, 95% CI 70–79) cases, with the median dose being 4 mg (IQR 3–6). Single doses were administered to 268 (72.2%, 95% CI 67–77) morphine administrations, five (56%, 95% CI 21–86) ketamine administrations and 161 (82%, 95% CI 76–87) of nitrate administrations. Chest pain was the reason for pain management in 226 (43%) cases. Advanced Life Support Providers had a median experience level of two years (IQR 2–4). Discussion: Pre-hospital acute pain management in the Western Cape does not appear to conform to best practice as Advanced Life Support providers in the Western Cape use low doses of morphine. Chest pain is an important reason for drug administration in acute pre-hospital pain. Multimodal analgesia is not a feature of care in this pre-hospital service. The development of a Clinical Practice Guideline for and training in pre-hospital pain should be viewed as imperative.