Triage sepsis alert and sepsis protocol lower times to fluids and antibiotics in the ED.

Background: Early identification of sepsis in the emergency department (ED), followed by adequate fluid hydration and appropriate antibiotics, improves patient outcomes.

Objectives: We sought to measure the impact of a sepsis workup and treatment protocol (SWAT) that included an electronic health record (EHR)-based triage sepsis alert, direct communication, mobilization of resources, and standardized order sets.

Methods: We conducted a retrospective, quasiexperimental study of adult ED patients admitted with suspected sepsis, severe sepsis, or septic shock.

Ultrasound-Guided Diagnosis of Femoral Osteomyelitis and Abscess.

Skin and soft tissue infections are common disease presentations to the pediatric emergency department, and rapid and accurate identification of potentially serious skin and soft tissue infections is critical. In cases of atraumatic musculoskeletal pain with systemic complaints, a bacterial etiology must be ruled out. Point-of-care ultrasonography is increasingly common in the pediatric emergency department and assists in rapid and accurate identification of a variety of disease processes.

Point-of-Care Ultrasound for Pediatric Shock.

The evaluation of critically ill children in the emergency department is oftentimes challenging. Point-of-care ultrasound is an essential tool in the rapid identification of reversible pathology and provides unique insight into the appropriate treatment approach. In this article, we discuss a straightforward sonographic approach to pediatric patients who present in shock.

Ketamine Saves the Day: Priapism in a Pediatric Psychiatric Patient.

Priapism is an adverse effect of medications used to treat psychiatric disorders. Often, this condition is self-limiting but may require urologic intervention involving aspiration and injection to induce detumescence. A case of a 15-year-old patient with priapism secondary to a long-acting stimulant is presented to describe the effectiveness of ketamine treatment for priapism.

Pulmonary embolism in the pediatric emergency department: a case demonstrating the application of point-of-care cardiac ultrasound in a pediatric patient with pulmonary embolism.

Although pulmonary embolism in children is rare, it is important for the pediatric emergency medicine provider to be aware of its presentation and emergent management. We present a case of bilateral pulmonary embolisms in an adolescent patient to illustrate the benefits from the timely diagnosis of right ventricular dysfunction by point-of-care echocardiography performed by emergency medicine physicians. Ultrasonographic techniques and the emergent management of pulmonary embolism are reviewed.

SonoGames: an innovative approach to emergency medicine resident ultrasound education.

SonoGames was created by the Academy of Emergency Ultrasound for the 2012 annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine. The assessment of resident knowledge and of the performance of point-of-care ultrasound examinations is an integral component of ultrasound education and is required in emergency medicine residency training. With that in mind, game organizers sought to assess and improve emergency medicine residents' point-of-care ultrasound knowledge, hands-on skills, and integration of knowledge into clinical decision making.

Ultrasound-guided diagnosis of occult mandibular osteomyelitis.

Background: Skin and soft-tissue infections (SSTIs) are common disease presentations to the emergency department (ED), with the majority of the infections attributed to community-acquired methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Rapid and accurate identification of potentially serious SSTIs is critical. Clinician-performed ultrasonography (CPUS) is increasingly common in the ED, and assists in rapid and accurate identification of a variety of disease processes.

Bowel obstruction and hernia.

Bowel obstruction and abdominal hernia are commonly observed in patients seeking emergency care for abdominal pain. This article discusses bowel obstruction, adynamic ileus, acute colonic pseudo-obstruction, and abdominal hernias, with particular emphasis on the management of patients in the emergency department (ED). Although the diagnostic approach to bowel obstruction often requires imaging, abdominal hernia may be identified in most circumstances by history and physical examination alone.

Intensivist use of hand-carried ultrasonography to measure IVC collapsibility in estimating intravascular volume status: correlations with CVP.

Background: Volume status assessment is an important aspect of patient management in the surgical intensive care unit (SICU). Echocardiologist-performed measurement of IVC collapsibility index (IVC-CI) provides useful information about filling pressures, but is limited by its portability, cost, and availability. Intensivist-performed bedside ultrasonography (INBU) examinations have the potential to overcome these impediments.

Hand-carried echocardiography for assessment of left ventricular filling and ejection fraction in the surgical intensive care unit.

Purpose: To better define the reliability of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) and left ventricular filling, as determined by either hand-carried ultrasound (HCU) or formal transthoracic echocardiography (TTE), in the critically ill surgical patient.

Materials And Methods: Prospective cross-sectional study of 80 surgical intensive care unit patients with concomitant (<30 minutes apart) formal TTE and clinician-performed cardiac HCU. Visual estimates of LVEF and left ventricular filling ("underfilled" vs "normally filled") were recorded, both by clinicians performing HCU and fellowship-trained echocardiographers.

Chest radiograph vs. computed tomography scan in the evaluation for pneumonia.

To determine, in an Emergency Department (ED) population, the incidence of pneumonia diagnosed on thoracic computed tomography (CT) in the setting of negative or non-diagnostic chest radiographs (CXR). This is a retrospective chart review of all ED visits of adult patients ultimately diagnosed with "pneumonia" in whom both CXR and CT were obtained. We note cases in which the CXR was either negative or non-diagnostic for pneumonia and the CT noted a definitive infiltrate consistent with pneumonia.

Electrocardiographic manifestations: diagnosis of atrioventricular block in the Emergency Department.

Patients with bradycardia are commonly encountered by the Emergency Physician. Of the possible bradydysrhythmias, atrioventricular blocks (AVB) represent a significant portion of these presentations. In this article, we provide four illustrative cases of patients presenting to the Emergency Department (ED) with AVB.

Electrocardiographic T-wave inversion: differential diagnosis in the chest pain patient.

Inverted T waves produced by myocardial ischemia are classically narrow and symmetric. T-wave inversion (TWI) associated with an acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is morphologically characterized by an isoelectric ST segment that is usually bowed upward (ie, concave) and followed by a sharp symmetric downstroke. The terms coronary T wave and coved T wave have been used to describe these ischemic TWIs.