SHoC-ED: Sonography in Hypotension and Cardiac Arrest in the Emergency Department.

STRUCTURED RESEARCH ABSTRACT

Introduction

Patients who present to the ED (emergency department) with undifferentiated, non-trauma associated hypotension are often affected by conditions with a prognosis largely dependent on the time taken from presentation to correct diagnosis and intervention. The ACES protocol (Abdominal and Cardiothoracic Evaluation with Sonography in Shock) provides a rapid focused ultrasound protocol for making or refining diagnoses in patients who present to the ED with this type of hypotension. This will be the first study to compare the clinical outcomes of patients who are assessed with the ACES protocol as part of their initial workup to those of patients who are assessed without any intervention by ultrasound. The goal of this study is to determine if ACES enhances the patient's clinical outcomes, as measured by: 1) Time to restoration (or improvement) of CVS (cardiovascular system) parameters, 2) Rate of normalization of acid-base balance, as well as venous lactate 3) Significant change in diagnosis or recommended intervention 4) Frequency of unexpected diagnosis, and 5) Patient 7 and 30-day, and discharge mortality rate.

Methods

SHoC-ED 1 is a stratified randomized control trial that will run in multiple centers across Canada and internationally. The data will be stratified in that each center involved will recruit equal amounts of control and intervention patients. While different centers will recruit different numbers of participants, each individual center will recruit near-equal amounts for each arm of the study.