May 31, 2018
Author: Dylan Luyten, MD
Educational Pearls:
- Most important questions to answer with low potassium are 1. What are their symptoms? 2. Can they take potassium by mouth?
- Oral repletion is faster, cheaper, and more effective than IV repletion.
- Give IV potassium when patients have K < 2.5 mmol/L or present with...
May 29, 2018
Author: Peter Bakes, M.D.
Educational Pearls:
- Epidural hematomas have a characteristic convex appearance on CT while a subdural hematoma will have a concave appearance.
- Indications for operative intervention for subdural hematoma may include: >5 mm midline shift, over 10 mm in thickness, comatose with ICP >20, or...
May 25, 2018
Author: Dylan Luyten, MD
Educational Pearls:
- Resuscitative thoracotomies are most commonly used for treatment of cardiac tamponade and to selectively perfuse the brain and heart in setting of hemorrhage control.
- Resuscitative thoracotomies are indicated in patients with penetrating injuries who lose vitals in the...
May 23, 2018
Author: Michael Hunt, MD
Educational Pearls:
- Studies have shown that patients with decreasing GCS scores have worse outcomes, however GCS of 4 has worse outcome than GCS 3.
- Alternative scoring system is the GCS-P score which is GCS score - number of non-reactive pupils.
- GCS3 50% mortality 70% poor outcome at 6...
May 21, 2018
Author: Nick Hatch, MD
Educational Pearls:
- Recent study argues that CHF patients receiving furosemide within 60 minutes of arrival had a lower in-hospital mortality than those receiving it after (2.3% vs. 6.0%, p=0.002).
- Flaw in study is that there were significant baseline differences between...