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Emergency Medical Minute

 

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...