Emergency physicians can feel pressured by opposing forces of clinical reality and the need to publish successful key performance indicators in an environment of increasing demands and cost containment. This is particularly relevant to management of patients with undifferentiated chest pain and possible acute coronary syndrome. Unreliability of clinical assessment and high risk of adverse outcomes for all concerned exist, yet national guidelines are at odds with efforts to reduce ED crowding and access block. We report findings from the Nambour Short Low-Intermediate Chest pain risk trial, which safely introduced an accelerated diagnostic protocol with reduced ED length of stay and high patient acceptability. Over a 7-month period, there were no major adverse cardiac events by 30 days in 19% of undifferentiated chest pain presentations with possible acute coronary syndrome discharged after normal sensitive cardiac troponin taken 2 h after presentation and scheduled to return for outpatient exercise stress test.
Keywords: acute coronary syndrome; chest pain; length of stay; risk assessment; troponin.
© 2013 Australasian College for Emergency Medicine and Australasian Society for Emergency Medicine.