Abstract
Introduction Medical emergencies occur within the dental setting and we have a duty of care to manage them appropriately. Due to perceived anxiety in handling medical emergencies, aide-mémoires were developed to improve staff confidence in the management of these stressful situations.
Methods A survey was carried out at The Royal London Dental Hospital to assess knowledge and experience in use of existing supportive materials for medical emergency management. New colour-coded flashcards were subsequently developed, providing guidance to identifying and managing medical emergencies. A questionnaire was produced assessing clinicians' awareness of existing prompts and preferences in relation to the new flashcards. Updated cards were incorporated into simulated medical emergency teaching and evaluated afterwards through a questionnaire.
Results A total of 50 responses were gathered across departments to the questionnaire regarding preliminary flashcards: 95% favoured the flashcard approach and felt they would be more helpful managing medical emergencies. The new flashcards were used by 18 clinicians in medical emergency simulation and 17 (94%) felt that using the cards improved their confidence in the handling of medical emergencies.
Discussion The flashcards have been perceived to be useful in the handling of medical emergencies within our dental hospital. A similar project may be beneficial to clinical teams working across dental settings.
Key points
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Competence in the management of medical emergencies is mandatory for all General Dental Council registrants.
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Medical emergency aide-mémoires can increase staff confidence in the handling of medical emergencies.
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Merits of prompt cards and their development are discussed to aid dental teams who may want to implement similar systems within their working environments.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the help of Dr Joanna Dick, consultant in Special care dentistry.
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Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
Amrisha Ondhia and Hanean Muhsin: joint lead of project, involved in data collection and write-up. Stacey Clough: supervisor of project and involved in write-up.
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Ethics declarations
The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.
The article we have submitted is regarding a quality improvement project as opposed to a research project. This quality improvement project was registered with our Trust as per our local guidelines. We did not seek any further ethical approval as did not feel this was necessary for a quality improvement project. The participants were briefed about the quality improvement project and verbal consent was given to participate and have their data used.
The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this project are available within the article. Raw data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.
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Ondhia, A., Muhsin, H. & Clough, S. A quality improvement project to improve the quality of medical emergency aide-mémoires. Br Dent J (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41415-023-6556-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41415-023-6556-4
