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The definition of severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) – a respiratory illness with fever and cough, occurring within the past 10 days and requiring hospital admission – has not been evaluated for critically ill patients. Using integrated electronic health records data, we developed an automated search algorithm to identify SARI cases in a large cohort of critical care patients and evaluate patient outcomes. We conducted a retrospective cohort study of all admissions to a medical intensive care unit from August 2009 through March 2016. Subsets were randomly selected for deriving and validating a search algorithm, which was compared with temporal trends in laboratory-confirmed influenza to ensure that SARI was correlated with influenza. The algorithm was applied to the cohort to identify clinical differences for patients with and without SARI. For identifying SARI, the algorithm (sensitivity, 86.9%; specificity, 95.6%) outperformed billing-based searching (sensitivity, 73.8%; specificity, 78.8%). Automated searching correlated with peaks in laboratory-confirmed influenza. Adjusted for severity of illness, SARI was associated with more hospital, intensive care unit and ventilator days but not with death or dismissal to home. The search algorithm accurately identified SARI for epidemiologic study and surveillance.

Mitral regurgitation is the most common valve disease worldwide but whether the community-wide prevalence, poor patient outcomes, and low rates of surgical treatment justify costly development of new therapeutic interventions remains uncertain. Therefore, we did an observational cohort study to assess the clinical characteristics, outcomes, and degree of undertreatment of mitral regurgitation in a community setting.We used data from Mayo Clinic electronic health records and the Rochester Epidemiology Project to identify all cases of moderate or severe isolated single-valvular mitral regurgitation (with no other severe left-sided valvular disease or previous mitral surgery) diagnosed during a 10-year period in the community setting in Olmsted County (MN, USA). We assessed clinical characteristics, mortality, heart failure incidence, and results of cardiac surgery post-diagnosis.Between Jan 1, 2000, and Dec 31, 2010, 1294 community residents (median age at diagnosis 77 years [IQR 66-84]) were diagnosed with moderate or severe mitral regurgitation by Doppler echocardiography (prevalence 0·46% [95% CI 0·42-0·49] overall; 0·59% [0·54-0·64] in adults). Left-ventricular ejection fraction below 50% was frequent (recorded in 538 [42%] patients), and these patients had a slightly lower regurgitant volume than those with an ejection fraction of 50% or higher (mean 39 mL [SD 16] vs 45 mL [21], p0·0001). Post-diagnosis mortality was mainly cardiovascular in nature (in 420 [51%] of 824 patients for whom the cause of death was available) and higher than expected for residents of the county for age or sex (risk ratio [RR] 2·23 [95% CI 2·06-2·41], p0·0001). This excess mortality affected all subsets of patients, whether they had a left-ventricular ejection fraction lower than 50% (RR 3·17 [95% CI 2·84-3·53], p0·0001) or of 50% or higher (1·71 [1·53 -1·91], p0·0001) and with primary mitral regurgitation (RR 1·73 [95% CI 1·53-1·96], p0·0001) or secondary mitral regurgitation (2·72 [2·48-3·01], p0·0001). Even patients with a low comorbidity burden combined with favourable characteristics such as left-ventricular ejection fraction of 50% or higher (RR 1·28 [95% CI 1·10-1·50], p0·0017) or primary mitral regurgitation (1·29 [1·09-1·52], p=0·0030) incurred excess mortality. Heart failure was frequent (mean 64% [SE 1] at 5 years postdiagnosis), even in patients with left-ventricular ejection fraction of 50% or higher (49% [2] at 5 years postdiagnosis) or in those with primary mitral regurgitation (48% [2]). Mitral surgery was ultimately done in only 198 (15%) of 1294 patients, of which the predominant type of surgery was valve repair (in 149 [75%] patients). Mitral surgery was done in 28 (5%) of 538 patients with left-ventricular ejection fraction below 50% and in 170 (22%) of 756 patients with ejection fraction of 50% or higher, and in 34 (5%) of 723 with secondary mitral regurgitation versus 164 (29%) of 571 with primary regurgitation. All other types of cardiac surgery combined were performed in only 3% more patients (237 [18%] patients) than the number who underwent mitral surgery.In the community, isolated mitral regurgitation is common and is associated with excess mortality and frequent heart failure postdiagnosis in all patient subsets, even in those with normal left-ventricular ejection fraction and low comorbidity. Despite these poor outcomes, only a minority of affected patients undergo mitral (or any type of cardiac) surgery even in a community with all means of diagnosis and treatment readily available and accessible. This suggests that in a wider population there might be a substantial unmet need for treatment for this disorder.Mayo Clinic Foundation.

Summary Objectives: Evidence-based clinical scores are used frequently in clinical practice, but data collection and data entry can be time consuming and hinder their use. We investigated the programmability of 168 common clinical calculators for automation within electronic health records. Methods: We manually reviewed and categorized variables from 168 clinical calculators as being extractable from structured data, unstructured data, or both. Advanced data retrieval methods from unstructured data sources were tabulated for diagnoses, non-laboratory test results, clinical history, and examination findings. Results: We identified 534 unique variables, of which 203/534 (37.8%) were extractable from structured data and 269/534 (50.4.7%) were potentially extractable using advanced techniques. Nearly half (265/534, 49.6%) of all variables were not retrievable. Only 26/168 (15.5%) of scores were completely programmable using only structured data and 43/168 (25.6%) could potentially be programmable using widely available advanced information retrieval techniques. Scores relying on clinical examination findings or clinical judgments were most often not completely programmable. Conclusion: Complete automation is not possible for most clinical scores because of the high prevalence of clinical examination findings or clinical judgments – partial automation is the most that can be achieved. The effect of fully or partially automated score calculation on clinical efficiency and clinical guideline adherence requires further study. Citation: Aakre C, Dziadzko M, Keegan MT, Herasevich V. Automating clinical score calculation within the electronic health record: A feasibility assessment. Appl Clin Inform 2017; 8: 369–380 https://doi.org/10.4338/ACI-2016-09-RA-0149

OBJECTIVEVentilator-associated events (VAEs) are nosocomial events correlated with length of stay, costs, and mortality. Current ventilator bundle practices target the older definition of ventilator-associated pneumonia and have not been systematically evaluated for their impact on VAEs.DESIGNRetrospective cohort study.SETTINGTertiary medical center between January 2012 and August 2014.PARTICIPANTSAll adult patients ventilated for at least 24 hours at our institution.INTERVENTIONSWe conducted univariate analyses for compliance with each element; we focused on VAEs occurring within a 2-day window of failure to meet any ventilator bundle element. We used Cox proportional hazard models to assess the effect of stress ulcer prophylaxis, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) prophylaxis, oral care, and sedation breaks on VAEs. We adjusted models for gender, age, and Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation (APACHE) III scores.RESULTSOur cohort comprised 2,660 patients with 16,858 ventilator days and 77 VAEs. Adjusting for APACHE score and gender, only oral care was associated with a reduction in the risk of VAE (hazard ratio [HR], 0.44; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.26–0.77). The DVT prophylaxis and sedation breaks did not show any significant impact on VAEs. Stress ulcer prophylaxis trended toward an increased risk of VAE (HR, 1.59; 95% CI, 1.00–2.56).CONCLUSIONAlthough limited by a low baseline rate of VAEs, existing ventilator bundle practices do not appear to target VAEs well. Oral care is clearly important, but the impact of DVT prophylaxis, sedation breaks, and especially stress ulcer prophylaxis are questionable at best.Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 2016;1453–1457

Aims To define the hitherto unknown aetiology/mechanism distributions of mitral regurgitation (MR) in the community and the linked clinical characteristics/outcomes. Methods and results We identified all isolated, moderate/severe MR diagnosed in our community (Olmsted County, MN, USA) between 2000 and 2010 and classified MR aetiology/mechanisms. Eligible patients (n = 727) were 73 ± 18 years, 51% females, with ejection fraction (EF) 49 ± 17%. MR was functional (FMR) in 65%, organic (OMR) in 32% and 2% mixed. Functional MR was linked to left ventricular remodelling (FMR-v) 38% and isolated atrial dilatation (FMR-a) 27%. At diagnosis FMR-v vs. FMR-a, vs. OMR displayed profound differences (all P Conclusion Moderate/severe isolated MR in the community displays considerable aetiology/mechanism heterogeneity. Functional MR dominates, mostly FMR-v but FMR-a is frequent and degenerative MR dominates OMR. Outcomes are mediocre with excess-mortality particularly with FMR-v but FMR-a, despite normal EF incurs notable excess-mortality and frequent heart failure. Pervasive undertreatment warrants clinical trials of therapies tailored to specific MR cause/mechanisms.

Background Acute respiratory failure occurs frequently in hospitalized patients and often starts before ICU admission. A risk stratification tool to predict mortality and risk for mechanical ventilation (MV) may allow for earlier evaluation and intervention. We developed and validated an automated electronic health record (EHR)-based model—Accurate Prediction of Prolonged Ventilation (APPROVE)—to identify patients at risk of death or respiratory failure requiring >= 48 h of MV. Methods This was an observational study of adults admitted to four hospitals in 2013 or a fifth hospital in 2017. Clinical data were extracted from the EHRs. The 2013 patients were randomly split 50:50 into a derivation/validation cohort. The qualifying event was death or intubation leading to MV >= 48 h. Random forest method was used in model derivation. APPROVE was calculated retrospectively whenever data were available in 2013, and prospectively every 4 h after hospital admission in 2017. The Modified Early Warning Score (MEWS) and National Early Warning Score (NEWS) were calculated at the same times as APPROVE. Clinicians were not alerted except for APPROVE in 2017cohort. Results There were 68,775 admissions in 2013 and 2258 in 2017. APPROVE had an area under the receiver operator curve of 0.87 (95% CI 0.85–0.88) in 2013 and 0.90 (95% CI 0.84–0.95) in 2017, which is significantly better than the MEWS and NEWS in 2013 but similar to the MEWS and NEWS in 2017. At a threshold of > 0.25, APPROVE had similar sensitivity and positive predictive value (PPV) (sensitivity 63% and PPV 21% in 2013 vs 64% and 16%, respectively, in 2017). Compared to APPROVE in 2013, at a threshold to achieve comparable PPV (19% at MEWS > 4 and 22% at NEWS > 6), the MEWS and NEWS had lower sensitivity (16% for MEWS and NEWS). Similarly in 2017, at a comparable sensitivity threshold (64% for APPROVE > 0.25 and 67% for MEWS and NEWS > 4), more patients who triggered an alert developed the event with APPROVE (PPV 16%) while achieving a lower false positive rate (FPR 5%) compared to the MEWS (PPV 7%, FPR 14%) and NEWS (PPV 4%, FPR 25%). Conclusions An automated EHR model to identify patients at high risk of MV or death was validated retrospectively and prospectively, and was determined to be feasible for real-time risk identification. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02488174. Registered on 18 March 2015. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s13054-018-2194-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Long-term cognitive impairment is common in survivors of critical illness. Little is known about the etiology of this serious complication. We sought to summarize current scientific knowledge about potentially modifiable risk factors during intensive care unit (ICU) treatment that may play a substantial role in the development of long-term cognitive impairment. All searches were run on October 1, 2017. The search strategy included Ovid MEDLINE, Ovid Embase, Ovid CDR, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effect, Scopus, and Web of Science, and included MeSH headings and keywords related to intensive care, critical care, and cognitive disorders. Searches were restricted to adult subjects. Inclusion required follow-up cognitive evaluation at least 2 months after ICU discharge. Studies assessing patients with cardiac arrest, traumatic brain injury, and cardiac surgery history were excluded. The search strategy resulted in 3180 studies. Of these, 28 studies (.88%) met our inclusion criteria and were analyzed. Delirium and duration of delirium were associated with long-term cognitive impairment after ICU admission in 6 of 9 studies in which this factor was analyzed. Weaker and more inconsistent associations have been reported with hypoglycemia, hyperglycemia, fluctuations in serum glucose levels, and in-hospital acute stress symptoms. Instead, most of the studies did not find significant associations between long-term cognitive impairment and mechanical ventilation; use of sedatives, vasopressors, or analgesic medications; enteral feeding; hypoxia; extracorporeal membrane oxygenation; systolic blood pressure; pulse rate; or length of ICU stay. Prolonged delirium may be a risk factor for long-term cognitive impairment after critical illness, though this association has not been entirely consistent across studies. Other potentially preventable factors have not been shown to have strong or consistent associations with long-term cognitive dysfunction in survivors of critical illness.

Objective Post-intensive care syndrome (PICS), which encompasses profound psychological morbidity, affects many survivors of critical illness. We hypothesize that acute psychological stress during the intensive care unit (ICU) confinement likely contributes to PICS. In order to develop strategies that mitigate PICS associated psychological morbidity, it is paramount to first characterize acute ICU psychological stress and begin to understand its causative and protective factors. Methods A structured interview study was administered to adult critical illness survivors who received ≥48h of mechanical ventilation in medical and surgical ICUs of a tertiary care center, and their families. Results Fifty patients and 44 family members were interviewed following ICU discharge. Patients reported a high level of psychological distress. The families' perception of patient's stress level correlated with the patient's self-estimated stress level both in daily life (rho=0.59; p p =0.002). 70% of patients experienced fear of death, 38% had additional other fears, 48% had hallucinations. Concerns included inability to communicate (34%), environmental factors (30%), procedures and restraints (24%), and being intubated (12%). Emotional support of family/friend/staff/clergy (86%), and physical therapy/walking (14%) were perceived to be important mitigating factors. Clinicians' actions that were perceived to be very constructive included reassurance (54%), explanations (32%) and physical touch (8%). Conclusions Fear, hallucinations, and the inability to communicate, are identified as central contributors to psychological stress during an ICU stay; the presence of family, and physician's attention are categorized as important mitigating factors. Patients and families identified several practical recommendations which may help assuage the psychological burden of the ICU stay.

Hyperglycemia control is associated with improved outcomes in patients undergoing cardiac surgery. The Surgical Care Improvement Project metric (SCIP-inf-4) was introduced as a performance measure in surgical patients and included hyperglycemia control. Compliance with the SCIP-inf-4 metric remains suboptimal. A novel real-time decision support tool (DST) with guaranteed feedback that is based on the existing electronic medical record system was developed at a tertiary academic center. Implementation of the DST increased the compliance rate with the SCIP-inf-4 from 87.3% to 96.5%. Changes in tested clinical outcomes were not observed with improved metric compliance. This new framework can serve as a backbone for development of quality control processes for other metrics. Further and, ideally, multicenter studies are required to test if implementation of electronic DSTs will translate into improved resource utilization and outcomes for patients.

Background The number of electronic health record (EHR)-based notifications continues to rise. One common method to deliver urgent and emergent notifications (alerts) is paging. Despite of wide presence of smartphones, the use of these devices for secure alerting remains a relatively new phenomenon. Methods We compared three methods of alert delivery (pagers, EHR-based notifications, and smartphones) to determine the best method of urgent alerting in the intensive care unit (ICU) setting. ICU clinicians received randomized automated sepsis alerts: pager, EHR-based notification, or a personal smartphone/tablet device. Time to notification acknowledgement, fatigue measurement, and user preferences (structured survey) were studied. Results Twenty three clinicians participated over the course of 3 months. A total of 48 randomized sepsis alerts were generated for 46 unique patients. Although all alerts were acknowledged, the primary outcome was confounded by technical failure of alert delivery in the smartphone/tablet arm. Median time to acknowledgment of urgent alerts was shorter by pager (102 mins) than EHR (169 mins). Secondary outcomes of fatigue measurement and user preference did not demonstrate significant differences between these notification delivery study arms. Conclusions Technical failure of secure smartphone/tablet alert delivery presents a barrier to testing the optimal method of urgent alert delivery in the ICU setting. Results from fatigue evaluation and user preferences for alert delivery methods were similar in all arms. Further investigation is thus necessary to understand human and technical barriers to implementation of commonplace modern technology in the hospital setting.

Purpose Extraoral mandibular nerve block (MNB) is used in oropharyngeal surgery for analgesia and anesthesia. Repeated or continuous MNB has been used successfully as treatment for uncontrollable pain, masseter spasticity, and airway assessment. The usual technique involves transcutaneous infrazygomatic access. However, in some specific settings, this approach is not always feasible. Materials and Methods A continuous bilateral MNB with a suprazygomatic approach to the pterygomandibular space was used to resolve a case of refractory and painful trismus in a patient with tetraplegia. Results Analgesia was achieved and maintained by bilateral catheter placement to the pterygomandibular space and repeated injection of local anesthetic for 48 hours. The right-side catheter was accidentally withdrawn; the left-side catheter was maintained up to 72 hours. The efficiency of analgesia was not affected. This block provided effective analgesia within the first few hours after local anesthetic injection, helped to improve mouth opening, and resolved acute pain. Because kinesitherapy could be introduced, the patient was left on nonopioid analgesics. Conclusion Continuous bilateral MNB through the suprazygomatic approach was used safely and efficiently. The suggested approach is quite unique, as is the clinical circumstance, and might be considered when the usual technique is challenging.

Objective: In this systematic review, we aimed to evaluate methodological and reporting trends present in the current literature by investigating published usability studies of electronic health records (EHRs). Methods: A literature search was conducted for articles published through January 2015 using MEDLINE (Ovid), EMBASE, Scopus, and Web of Science, supplemented by citation and reference list reviews. Studies were included if they tested the usability of hospital and clinic EHR systems in the inpatient, outpatient, emergency department, or operating room setting. Results: A total of 4848 references were identified for title and abstract screening. Full text screening was performed for 197 articles, with 120 meeting the criteria for study inclusion. Conclusion: A review of the literature demonstrates a paucity of quality published studies describing scientifically valid and reproducible usability evaluations at various stages of EHR system development. A lack of formal and standardized reporting of EHR usability evaluation results is a major contributor to this knowledge gap, and efforts to improve this deficiency will be one step of moving the field of usability engineering forward.

Objective Failure to rapidly identify high-value information due to inappropriate output may alter user acceptance and satisfaction. The information needs for different intensive care unit (ICU) providers are not the same. This can obstruct successful implementation of electronic medical record (EMR) systems. We evaluated the implementation experience and satisfaction of providers using a novel EMR interface—based on the information needs of ICU providers—in the context of an existing EMR system. Methods This before–after study was performed in the ICU setting at two tertiary care hospitals from October 2013 through November 2014. Surveys were delivered to ICU providers before and after implementation of the novel EMR interface. Overall satisfaction and acceptance was reported for both interfaces. Results A total of 246 before (existing EMR) and 115 after (existing EMR + novel EMR interface) surveys were analyzed. 14% of respondents were prescribers and 86% were non-prescribers. Non-prescribers were more satisfied with the existing EMR, whereas prescribers were more satisfied with the novel EMR interface. Both groups reported easier data gathering, routine tasks & rounding, and fostering of team work with the novel EMR interface. This interface was the primary tool for 18% of respondents after implementation and 73% of respondents intended to use it further. Non-prescribers reported an intention to use this novel interface as their primary tool for information gathering. Conclusion Compliance and acceptance of new system is not related to previous duration of work in ICU, but ameliorates with the length of EMR interface usage. Task-specific and role-specific considerations are necessary for design and successful implementation of a EMR interface. The difference in user workflows causes disparity of the way of EMR data usage.

Pain in cancer therapy is a common condition and there is a need for new options in therapeutic management. While phytochemicals have been proposed as one pain management solution, knowledge of their utility is limited. The objective of this study was to perform a systematic review of the biomedical literature for the use of phytochemicals for management of cancer therapy pain in human subjects. Of an initial database search of 1,603 abstracts, 32 full-text articles were eligible for further assessment. Only 7 of these articles met all inclusion criteria for this systematic review. The average relative risk of phytochemical versus control was 1.03 [95% CI 0.59 to 2.06]. In other words (although not statistically significant), patients treated with phytochemicals were slightly more likely than patients treated with control to obtain successful management of pain in cancer therapy. We identified a lack of quality research literature on this subject and thus were unable to demonstrate a clear therapeutic benefit for either general or specific use of phytochemicals in the management of cancer pain. This lack of data is especially apparent for psychotropic phytochemicals, such as theCannabisplant (marijuana). Additional implications of our findings are also explored.