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Study Helps Identify Patients for Restraint — Young men with alcohol/drug use; and some seniors, too
Most patients restrained in emergency departments (EDs) fall into two categories -- a relatively young and predominantly male group presenting with alcohol or drug use, and an older group with medical complaints, recent research shows.
"Our data found strong association of alcohol or drug use with physical restraints and identified a unique elderly population with behavioral disturbances in the ED," the researchers wrote in Annals of Emergency Medicine.
They explained that knowing which agitated patients in the ED could require restraint is valuable information because of a steadily growing number of behavioral emergencies and grave risks associated with restraint.
Source: Medpage Today