Observational studyScandinavian journal of trauma, resuscitation and emergency medicine2020
Can non-physician advanced retrieval practitioners (ARP) acquire and interpret diagnostic views of the lungs with sufficient quality to aid in the diagnosis of pneumothorax in the pre-hospital and retrieval environment?
Observational study in Scandinavian journal of trauma, resuscitation and emergency medicine, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 16 citations in OpenAlex.
- Helicopter emergency medical services use of thoracic point of care ultrasound for pneumothorax: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Scandinavian journal of trauma, resuscitation and emergency medicine · 2021Pooled it
- Diagnostic Accuracy of Point-of-Care Ultrasound in Detecting Pneumothorax: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Cureus · 2026Review
- Implementation of a point-of-care ultrasound archiving system and governance framework in a UK physician-paramedic staffed helicopter emergency medical service.Scandinavian journal of trauma, resuscitation and emergency medicine · 2024Article
- Use of Point-of-Care Ultrasound by Non-Physicians to Assess Respiratory Distress in the Out-of-Hospital Environment: A Scoping Review.Prehospital and disaster medicine · 2022Article
- Quality of focused thoracic ultrasound performed by emergency medical technicians and paramedics in a prehospital setting: a feasibility study.Scandinavian journal of trauma, resuscitation and emergency medicine · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundAs an adjunct to physical examination, ultrasound is a potentially attractive option for diagnosing pneumothoraces in the pre-hospital and retrieval environment - and could confer a benefit to patient safety. However, the published evidence supporting non-physicians use of ultrasound in this setting is limited.
aimWe aimed to establish if Advanced Retrieval Practitioners (non-physicians) could acquire ultrasound views of the lungs and interpret them with sufficient quality to diagnose pneumothorax in the pre-hospital and retrieval environment when compared to expert review.
methodThe study consisted of an observational trial from April 2017 to April 2018. Twelve (12) patients bilateral lung ultrasound images (24 images) were randomly selected from 87 patients assessed using Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS) by three Advanced Retrieval Practitioners in the Pre-hospital and Retrieval environment. Two expert reviewers' evaluated these images to determine ARPs ability to acquire diagnostic quality images and interpret them correctly. CXR results of patients in whom lung ultrasound was undertaken were recorded as the reference standard investigation.
resultsWithin the 22 images considered adequate by the Advanced Retrieval Practitioners, 19 (86.4%, one-tailed McNemar test p = 0.125) were considered adequate on expert review. Of the 19 images mutually considered as adequate, both the Advanced Retrieval Practitioners and the reviewers identified two pneumothoraces which were subsequently confirmed on chest x-ray (Sensitivity 100% and Specificity 100% in technically adequate images). One pneumothorax was detected on CXR in a patient with inadequate ultrasound images. Advanced Retrieval Practitioners were therefore able to both obtain adequate images and correctly diagnose pneumothorax in the pre-hospital environment with 66.6% sensitivity (95%CI 66.6-100%) and 100% specificity (95%CI 81.0-100%) compared to expert review.
conclusionAdvanced Retrieval Practitioners (non-physicians) can obtain diagnostic views of the lungs of sufficient quality to diagnose the presence, or particularly the absence, of pneumothorax in the pre-hospital and retrieval environment. Although Advanced Retrieval Practitioners were less accurate than the expert reviewers at interpreting the quality of the ultrasound images, the result was not statistically significant, despite the ARPs possibly having been at a methodological disadvantage.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.