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Peter Akpunonu, MD, Assistant Professor, Julia Martin, MD, Professor, and Regan Baum, PharmD, of the Department of Emergency Medicine, are listed among the  Co-PI’s on Kentucky’s application “Overdose Data To Action (OD2A),” which has been funded by the CDC. UK’s Kentucky Injury and Prevention Research Center (KIPRC) was awarded the 23 million grant to help fight the opioid epidemic. The award includes approval of an innovative strategy to perform public health surveillance on blood/urine remnant samples in the UKHealthcare ED, to reduce the burden of substance use disorders and drug overdoses in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. You can read more about the 23 million grant at UKNow, University of Kentucky News.

Check out the journal article, Flecainide Toxicity Resulting in Pacemaker Latency and Intermittent Failure to Capture, by Peter Akpunonu, MD, and Regan Baum, PharmD, et al. published in the August issue of American Journal of Case Reports.

Suffredini JM, Rutland J, Akpunonu P, Baum R, Catanzaro J, Elayi CS. Flecainide Toxicity Resulting in Pacemaker Latency and Intermittent Failure to Capture. The American journal of case reports. 201930; 20 : 1279-1283.

Emergency medicine residents and faculty were hosted at a local horse farm for their Wilderness Medicine Day. This event allowed the residents to leave the classroom and practice hands-on wilderness medicine skills in an outdoor setting.

Grouped into small teams, residents had to overcome common wilderness obstacles and provide patient assessment and procedures in an environment where typical health care resources were not available.

Check out articles, Depression: Emergency Department Evaluation and Management posted August 29, 2019, and Basilar Skull Fracture: Basics & Beyond, posted June 6, 2019, by Sameer Desai, MD, FACEP. Both articles are located under the Practice Updates category at emDOCs.net.

Dr. Desai serves as Associate Professor and Residency Program Director at the University of Kentucky Department of Emergency Medicine.

A number of University of Kentucky, Department of Emergency Medicine faculty and staff (Dr. Roger Humphries, Dr. Peter Akpunonu, Dr. Craig Carter, Dr. Sameer Desai, Dr. Joel Hamm, Linda Dechtenberg, Brian Dennis, Theresa Mims, and Joann Short) are collaborators on the research article discussing the question, Does intensive glucose control improve functional outcome in patients with hyperglycemic acute ischemic stroke?

The Conclusion and Relevance stated, “Among patients with acute ischemic stroke and hyperglycemia, treatment with intensive vs standard glucose control for up to 72 hours did not result in a significant difference in favorable functional outcome at 90 days. These findings do not support using intensive glucose control in this setting.” Click on the citation below to read more.

Johnston KC, Bruno A, Pauls Q, et al. Intensive vs Standard Treatment of Hyperglycemia and Functional Outcome in Patients With Acute Ischemic Stroke: The SHINE Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA.2019;322(4):326–335.