Publications by authors named "Daniel Balk"

Undifferentiated abdominal pain in adults is a common chief complaint in acute care clinics and emergency departments worldwide, representing up to 10% of visits to emergency departments. Many patients have a non-specific presentation and an initial workup with labwork, urine analysis or X-ray might not reveal a specific diagnosis. Although bowel intussusception is a primarily pediatric disease, adult intussusception is a recognized but rare cause of bowel obstruction often requiring surgical intervention.

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Focused assessment with sonography for trauma (FAST) has been incorporated into the initial evaluation of trauma for decades. It is an important screening tool in the detection of intra-abdominal fluid. The objective of this study was to perform a systematic review of the use and accuracy of FAST as an imaging tool for blunt abdominal trauma in disaster/mass casualty settings.

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Background: Ocular point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is a fast and safe non-invasive procedure used to evaluate the structural integrity and pathology of the eye. Ocular POCUS can be used for evaluation of posterior chamber and orbital pathology, including retinal detachment, vitreous detachment or hemorrhage, foreign body, lens dislocation, and increased intracranial pressure.

Discussion: The purpose of this brief communication is to describe a technique for conducting an ocular POCUS that may in some cases be easier and more comfortable by adjusting the position of the sonographer relative to the patient.

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Objective: Although a clinical diagnosis, the standard initial imaging modality for patients with concern for pediatric community acquired pneumonia (pCAP) is a chest x-ray (CXR), which has a relatively high false negative rate, exposes patients to ionizing radiation, and may not be available in resource limited settings. The primary objective of this meta-analysis is to evaluate the accuracy of lung ultrasound (LUS) compared to CXR for the diagnosis of pCAP.

Methods: Data were collected via a systematic review of PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science with dates up to August 2017.

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Previous research on individuals with anxiety disorders has demonstrated that both childhood peer maltreatment and concerns about negative self-portrayal are related to elevated symptoms of social anxiety (SA). In the present study, we examined whether concerns about negative self-portrayal might either moderate or mediate the relation between recalled childhood teasing history and current symptoms of SA in a non-treatment-seeking clinical sample of 238 individuals with anxiety disorders. Participants completed the Teasing Questionnaire-Revised (TQ-R), the Negative Self-Portrayal Scale (NSPS), and the Social Phobia Inventory (SPIN).

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Many animals fight to win resources, repel competitors or establish dominance in a social group. Mutual-assessment of fighting ability, where competitors gather and compare information about their opponent's as well as their own fighting ability has been the dominant theoretical framework for understanding decision-making during fights. However, self-assessment, where each individual has a cost threshold and fights up until that point, may be more common than previously appreciated.

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