scholarly journals Into the Night: Factors affecting response to abnormal Early Warning Scores out-of-hours and implications for service improvement

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 56-60
Author(s):  
C J Yiu ◽  
◽  
S U Khan ◽  
Christian P Subbe ◽  
K Tofeec ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Nursing Staff ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Service Evaluation ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Service Improvement ◽  
Out Of Hours ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Alarm Fatigue ◽  
Early Warning Scores ◽  
Medical Wards

Background: Early Warning Scores alert staff to preventable deterioration. Raised scores should lead to escalation of care. Aims: To establish response of staff to patients scoring National Early Warning Score (NEWS) of six or above and to identify patient and environmental factors affecting escalation by nursing staff. Methods: Service evaluation with prospective review of patient records of 118 beds on four medical wards during 20 night-shifts. Results: During 2360 observed bed days 109 patients triggered NEWS >=6 at least once during the observation period. Nursing staff escalated only 18 (17%) of these patients; nearly all of them had predefined chronic health conditions, the majority fulfilled criteria for frailty. Despite their higher 30-day mortality patients with COPD had lower escalation rates. Additionally wards that had more patients with a NEWS >=6 had lower escalation rates. Conclusion: Alarm fatigue and clinical judgement of staff might result in deviation from escalation protocols.

scholarly journals Early identification of severe community-acquired pneumonia: a retrospective observational study

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. e000438 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frances S Grudzinska ◽  
Kerrie Aldridge ◽  
Sian Hughes ◽  
Peter Nightingale ◽  
Dhruv Parekh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Early Warning ◽  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Characteristic Curve ◽  
Community Acquired Pneumonia ◽  
Adverse Outcomes ◽  
Assessment Tools ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
News Medium ◽  
Increased Risk ◽  
Early Warning Scores

BackgroundCommunity-acquired pneumonia (CAP) is a leading cause of sepsis worldwide. Prompt identification of those at high risk of adverse outcomes improves survival by enabling early escalation of care. There are multiple severity assessment tools recommended for risk stratification; however, there is no consensus as to which tool should be used for those with CAP. We sought to assess whether pneumonia-specific, generic sepsis or early warning scores were most accurate at predicting adverse outcomes.MethodsWe performed a retrospective analysis of all cases of CAP admitted to a large, adult tertiary hospital in the UK between October 2014 and January 2016. All cases of CAP were eligible for inclusion and were reviewed by a senior respiratory physician to confirm the diagnosis. The association between the CURB65, Lac-CURB-65, quick Sequential (Sepsis-related) Organ Failure Assessment tool (qSOFA) score and National Early Warning Score (NEWS) at the time of admission and outcome measures including intensive care admission, length of hospital stay, in-hospital, 30-day, 90-day and 365-day all-cause mortality was assessed.Results1545 cases were included with 30-day mortality of 19%. Increasing score was significantly associated with increased risk of poor outcomes for all four tools. Overall accuracy assessed by receiver operating characteristic curve analysis was significantly greater for the CURB65 and Lac-CURB-65 scores than qSOFA. At admission, a CURB65 ≥2, Lac-CURB-65 ≥moderate, qSOFA ≥2 and NEWS ≥medium identified 85.0%, 96.4%, 40.3% and 79.0% of those who died within 30 days, respectively. A Lac-CURB-65 ≥moderate had the highest negative predictive value: 95.6%.ConclusionAll four scoring systems can stratify according to increasing risk in CAP; however, when a confident diagnosis of pneumonia can be made, these data support the use of pneumonia-specific tools rather than generic sepsis or early warning scores.

scholarly journals Factors affecting the clinical response to National Early Warning score triggers

Critical Care ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (Suppl 1) ◽  
pp. P45 ◽  
Author(s):  
I Kolic ◽  
S McCartney ◽  
S Crane ◽  
Z Perkins ◽  
A Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Clinical Response ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
National Early Warning Score

Early Warning Score Communication Bundle: A Pilot Study

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 238-242
Author(s):  
Cheryl Gagne ◽  
Susan Fetzer
Keyword(s):  
Intensive Care Unit ◽  
Intensive Care ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Rapid Response Team ◽  
Rapid Response ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Early Warning Scores ◽  
Response Team ◽  
Intensive Care Unit Nurses ◽  
The Impact

Background Unplanned admissions of patients to intensive care units from medical-surgical units often result from failure to recognize clinical deterioration. The early warning score is a clinical decision support tool for nurse surveillance but must be communicated to nurses and implemented appropriately. A communication process including collaboration with experienced intensive care unit nurses may reduce unplanned transfers. Objective To determine the impact of an early warning score communication bundle on medical-surgical transfers to the intensive care unit, rapid response team calls, and morbidity of patients upon intensive care unit transfer. Methods After an early warning score was electronically embedded into medical records, a communication bundle including notification of and telephone collaboration between medical-surgical and intensive care unit nurses was implemented. Data were collected 3 months before and 21 months after implementation. Results Rapid response team calls increased nonsignificantly during the study period (from 6.47 to 8.29 per 1000 patient-days). Rapid response team calls for patients with early warning scores greater than 4 declined (from 2.04 to 1.77 per 1000 patient-days). Intensive care unit admissions of patients after rapid response team calls significantly declined (P = .03), as did admissions of patients with early warning scores greater than 4 (P = .01), suggesting that earlier intervention for patient deterioration occurred. Documented reassessment response time declined significantly to 28 minutes (P = .002). Conclusion Electronic surveillance and collaboration with experienced intensive care unit nurses may improve care, control costs, and save lives. Critical care nurses have a role in coaching and guiding less experienced nurses.

scholarly journals Use of paediatric early warning scores in intermediate care units

2019 ◽  
pp. archdischild-2019-317055
Author(s):  
Marie Emilie Lampin ◽  
Alain Duhamel ◽  
Hélène Behal ◽  
Morgan Recher ◽  
Francis Leclerc ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Early Warning ◽  
Emergency Departments ◽  
Repeated Measures ◽  
Medical Intervention ◽  
Clinical Deterioration ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Receiver Operating Curve ◽  
Intermediate Care ◽  
Derivation Cohort ◽  
Early Warning Scores

ObjectivePaediatric early warning scores (EWS) were developed to detect deterioration in paediatric wards or emergency departments. The aim of this study was to assess the relationship between three paediatric EWS and clinical deterioration detected by the nurse in paediatric intermediate care units (PImCU).MethodsThis was a prospective, observational, multicentre study at seven French regional hospitals that included all children <18 years of age. Clinical parameters included in three EWS (Paediatric Advanced Warning Score, Paediatric Early Warning Score and Bedside Paediatric Early Warning System) were prospectively recorded every 8 hours or in case of deterioration. The outcome was a call to physician by the nurse when a clinical deterioration was observed. The cohort was divided into derivation and validation cohorts. An updated methodology for repeated measures was used and discrimination was estimated by the area under the receiver-operating curve.ResultsA total of 2636 children were included for 14 708 observations to compute a posteriori the EWS. The discrimination of the three EWS for predicting calls to physicians by nurses was good (range: 0.87–0.91) for the derivation cohort and moderate (range: 0.71–0.76) for the validation cohort. Equations for probability thresholds of calls to physicians, taking into account the time t, the score at time t and the score at admission, are available.ConclusionThese three EWS developed for children in paediatric wards or emergency departments can be used in PImCU to detect a clinical deterioration and predict the need for medical intervention.

scholarly journals Comparison of early warning scores for sepsis early identification and prediction in the general ward setting

JAMIA Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean C Yu ◽  
Nirmala Shivakumar ◽  
Kevin Betthauser ◽  
Aditi Gupta ◽  
Albert M Lai ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Positive Predictive Value ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Predictive Value ◽  
Early Identification ◽  
Academic Medical Center ◽  
Scoring Systems ◽  
General Ward ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Patient Acuity ◽  
Early Warning Scores

Abstract The objective of this study was to directly compare the ability of commonly used early warning scores (EWS) for early identification and prediction of sepsis in the general ward setting. For general ward patients at a large, academic medical center between early-2012 and mid-2018, common EWS and patient acuity scoring systems were calculated from electronic health records (EHR) data for patients that both met and did not meet Sepsis-3 criteria. For identification of sepsis at index time, National Early Warning Score 2 (NEWS 2) had the highest performance (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve: 0.803 [95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.795–0.811], area under the precision recall curves: 0.130 [95% CI: 0.121–0.140]) followed NEWS, Modified Early Warning Score, and quick Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (qSOFA). Using validated thresholds, NEWS 2 also had the highest recall (0.758 [95% CI: 0.736–0.778]) but qSOFA had the highest specificity (0.950 [95% CI: 0.948–0.952]), positive predictive value (0.184 [95% CI: 0.169–0.198]), and F1 score (0.236 [95% CI: 0.220–0.253]). While NEWS 2 outperformed all other compared EWS and patient acuity scores, due to the low prevalence of sepsis, all scoring systems were prone to false positives (low positive predictive value without drastic sacrifices in sensitivity), thus leaving room for more computationally advanced approaches.

scholarly journals Use of an electronic early warning score and mortality for patients admitted out of hours to a large teaching hospital

Critical Care ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 19 (Suppl 1) ◽  
pp. P408 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Bannard-Smith ◽  
S Abbas ◽  
S Ingleby ◽  
C Fullwood ◽  
S Jones ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Teaching Hospital ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Out Of Hours ◽  
Large Teaching Hospital

scholarly journals Examining the utility of the Hamilton early warning scores (HEWS) at triage: Retrospective pilot study in a Canadian emergency department

CJEM ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 266-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Skitch ◽  
Benjamin Tam ◽  
Michael Xu ◽  
Laura McInnis ◽  
Anthony Vu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
At Risk ◽  
Emergency Department ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Vital Signs ◽  
Roc Curves ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Critical Event ◽  
Discriminative Ability ◽  
Early Warning Scores ◽  
Patients At Risk

ABSTRACTObjectivesEarly warning scores use vital signs to identify patients at risk of critical illness. The current study examines the Hamilton Early Warning Score (HEWS) at emergency department (ED) triage among patients who experienced a critical event during their hospitalization. HEWS was also evaluated as a predictor of sepsis.MethodsThe study population included admissions to two hospitals over a 6-month period. Cases experienced a critical event defined by unplanned intensive care unit admission, cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or death. Controls were randomly selected from the database in a 2-to-1 ratio to match cases on the burden of comorbid illness. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to evaluate HEWS as a predictor of the likelihood of critical deterioration and sepsis.ResultsThe sample included 845 patients, of whom 270 experienced a critical event; 89 patients were excluded because of missing vitals. An ROC analysis indicated that HEWS at ED triage had poor discriminative ability for predicting the likelihood of experiencing a critical event 0.62 (95% CI 0.58-0.66). HEWS had a fair discriminative ability for meeting criteria for sepsis 0.77 (95% CI 0.72-0.82) and good discriminative ability for predicting the occurrence of a critical event among septic patients 0.82 (95% CI 0.75-0.90).ConclusionThis study indicates that HEWS at ED triage has limited utility for identifying patients at risk of experiencing a critical event. However, HEWS may allow earlier identification of septic patients. Prospective studies are needed to further delineate the utility of the HEWS to identify septic patients in the ED.

scholarly journals Continuous monitoring in COVID-19 care; a retrospective study in time of crisis

JAMIA Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roy de Ree ◽  
Jorn Willemsen ◽  
Gilbert te Grotenhuis ◽  
Rick de Ree ◽  
Joé Kolkert ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Adverse Events ◽  
Respiratory Rate ◽  
Nursing Staff ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Wireless Sensors ◽  
Continuous Monitoring ◽  
Vital Signs ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Monitoring Systems ◽  
Patients At Risk

Abstract Background A new monitoring system was implemented to support nursing staff and physicians on the COVID-19 ward. This system was designed to remotely monitor vital signs, to calculate an automated Early Warning Score (aEWS) and to help identify patients at risk of deterioration. Methods Hospitalized patients who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 were connected to two wireless sensors measuring vital signs. Patients were divided into two groups based on the occurrence of adverse events during hospitalization. Heart and respiratory rate were monitored continuously and an automated EWS was calculated every 5 minutes. Data were compared between groups. Results Prior to the occurrence of adverse events, significantly higher median heart and respiration rate and significantly lower median SPO2 values were observed. Mean and median automated EWS were significantly higher in patients with an adverse event. Conclusion Continuous monitoring systems might help to detect clinical deterioration in COVID-19 patients at an earlier stage. Lay Summary A new monitoring system was implemented to support nursing staff and physicians on the COVID-19 ward. This system was designed to remotely monitor vital signs, like respiratory rate, heart rate and the oxygen level in the blood. These parameters were used to calculate an automated early warning score which helps to identify patients at risk of deterioration. Hospitalized patients who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 were connected to two wireless sensors. Heart and respiratory rate were monitored continuously and an automated EWS was calculated every 5 minutes. Data were compared between patients at the COVID-19 ward and patients who were transported to the ICU or died. COVID patients at the ICU or those who died had significantly higher median heart and respiration rate and significantly lower median oxygen levels. These findings showed that continuous monitoring systems might help to detect clinical deterioration in COVID-19 patients at an earlier stage.

Pre-hospital use of early warning scores to improve detection and outcomes of sepsis

2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 122-129
Author(s):  
Marina Maciver
Keyword(s):  
Patient Outcomes ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Hospital Setting ◽  
High Sensitivity ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Bibliographic Databases ◽  
Eligibility Criteria ◽  
Early Warning Scores ◽  
Life Threatening ◽  
Hospital Use

Sepsis is a life-threatening complication from infection. The early detection of sepsis pre-hospital is challenging. Early warning scores (EWS) are used in hospitals to identify deteriorating patients. The pre-hospital setting could be a beneficial extension to the use of EWSs. This review aimed to determine whether EWSs can identify patients with sepsis pre-hospital and predict patient outcomes. Bibliographic databases were searched for studies evaluating the pre-hospital use of EWSs. Studies were screened using eligibility criteria. Two studies examined the ability of pre-hospital EWSs to identify patients with critical illness, showing high sensitivity but low specificity. Four studies determined the prognostic effects of the National Early Warning Score (NEWS). The patients identified by NEWS to be high-risk were associated with worse outcomes. This systematic review demonstrated the successful use of EWSs in the pre-hospital setting, in identifying patients most at risk of deterioration and as a useful tool for decision-making.

scholarly journals Early Warning Scores in Patients with Suspected COVID-19 Infection in Emergency Departments

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 170
Author(s):  
Francisco Martín-Rodríguez ◽  
José L. Martín-Conty ◽  
Ancor Sanz-García ◽  
Virginia Carbajosa Rodríguez ◽  
Guillermo Ortega Rabbione ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Early Warning ◽  
Emergency Departments ◽  
Life Support ◽  
Area Under The Curve ◽  
Advanced Life Support ◽  
Early Mortality ◽  
Early Warning Score ◽  
Mortality Data ◽  
Early Warning Scores ◽  
National Early Warning Score

Early warning scores (EWSs) help prevent and recognize and thereby act as the first signs of clinical and physiological deterioration. The objective of this study is to evaluate different EWSs (National Early Warning Score 2 (NEWS2), quick sequential organ failure assessment score (qSOFA), Modified Rapid Emergency Medicine Score (MREMS) and Rapid Acute Physiology Score (RAPS)) to predict mortality within the first 48 h in patients suspected to have Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). We conducted a retrospective observational study in patients over 18 years of age who were treated by the advanced life support units and transferred to the emergency departments between March and July of 2020. Each patient was followed for two days registering their final diagnosis and mortality data. A total of 663 patients were included in our study. Early mortality within the first 48 h affected 53 patients (8.3%). The scale with the best capacity to predict early mortality was the National Early Warning Score 2 (NEWS2), with an area under the curve of 0.825 (95% CI: 0.75–0.89). The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) positive patients presented an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.804 (95% CI: 0.71–0.89), and the negative ones with an AUC of 0.863 (95% CI: 0.76–0.95). Among the EWSs, NEWS2 presented the best predictive power, even when it was separately applied to patients who tested positive and negative for SARS-CoV-2.

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