bestBETs

You attend the scene of a vehicle collision and find a 23 year old male unbelted in the drivers seat, slumped over the steering wheel unconscious. As the patient is rapidly extricated to the waiting ambulance, you note spidering of the windshield from the patient’s head and airbag deployment. Rapid ATLS exam reveals that the patient requires thoracostomy for a suspected tension pneumothorax. You have recently heard about finger thoracostomy as an alternative to needle decompression and wonder if this would be effective.

A 68 year-old male is brought to the emergency department with tachypnea (32 breaths per minute), tachycardia and a core temperature of 39.2°C. He complains of a progressive back pain since 3 days and recently noticed hematuria. In the emergency department, his systemic arterial blood pressure is 80/56 mm Hg and his heart rate 136 beats per minute. You suspect a severe sepsis from an acute pyelonephritis. To restore the blood pressure, you administer a first bolus of intravenous crystalloid. To guide your fluid therapy, you wonder if bedside lung ultrasound will help you assess the interstitial fluid status of your patient to avoid over-hydration.

You are a final year medical student visiting US for a Month long clinical rotation in the department of cardiothoracic surgery. During the Grand Rounds the attending surgeon makes a statement that the use of cerebral oximetry is not clinically significant and puts an extra burden on the patient’s medical bills. He tells you that there is not much evidence regarding effectiveness of Cerebral Oximetry (Transcranial Near-Infrared Spectroscopy-NIRS to monitor ScO2) for Cardiac Surgery and about its potential applications, overall clinical value and whether to keep using it or not. You take the issue at hand to check the literature yourself and reach a conclusion.

An 86 year old man is admitted to the respiratory ward with his third pneumonia in 6 months. A bedside swallow exam is abnormal however; no overt signs of aspiration / penetration are evident. The next available date for videofluoroscopy is in a week. We wonder if there is a sensitive predictor of silent aspiration that could be used at bedside. We have heard of cough reflex testing but wonder about its evidence base.

The Trust introduced a new blood collection system that stated the tourniquet should be removed prior to blood collection during routine venepuncture. You conducted a quick survey of staff that revealed all clinicians (apart from one nurse who had recently attended her venepuncture training) leave tourniquets in place throughout the blood collection phase. You checked the current Trust policy, which also states that tourniquets should be removed prior to blood sampling. No rationale for this instruction is given and you wonder why tourniquet removal is recommended in the Trust policy. You carried out a quick Internet search that seemed to indicate serum electrolytes (potassium in particular) can be affected if the tourniquet is left on during blood collection.

A 56 yo homeless man with a history of alcoholism and stroke is brought to the ED after he was seen sleeping on a park bench in the snow without shoes. He is rousable but 34 F [not sure about this - reads more like Celsius] and is clearly intoxicated with a blood EtOH of 0.22 mg/dL. After giving the patient initial re-warming treatment with warmed blankets, you notice his toes appear severely frostbitten. You know tPA therapy is absolutely contraindicated in this man, but wonder if something else will decrease the likelihood of this man’s toes being amputated.

Very few environments rival the complexity, unpredictability, acuity, time pressures and decision density of the Emergency Department (ED)1,2. Unsurprisingly it has been described as a natural laboratory for human error3. Despite the skills of the Emergency Physician in making decisions, an unacceptable number of decisions made in the process of medical diagnoses are wrong with error or diagnostic failure rate estimated to occur in 10-15% of decisions in the ED4. Expert opinions within Emergency Medicine have highlighted the role of cognitive debiasing strategies5 and cognitive forcing strategies6 to decrease the error attributable to cognition. The need to take all available steps to prevent error and harm from occurring has been highlighted as a moral and professional obligation in order to honour the ethical principles of beneficence, non-maleficence, fairness and justice7.

A 30-year-old male attends the Emergency Department with a dislocated shoulder, confirmed by plain film x-rays. This requires manipulayion and reduction under conscious sedation. You prepare your drugs, drawing up propofol. The patient however mentions that he had experienced some severe pain on the injection site during a previous sedation with a propofol. You remember one of your colleagues mentioning lidocaine use to prevent pain on propofol injection and wonder if there is any evidence for its use. 

A 4 year old boy comes in to the ED with 3 days of vomiting and diarrhea. Given the history and exam, you determine this child has gastroenteritis with signs of dehydration. His fingerstick blood glucose is 80 mg/dL (4.44 mmol/L). As the treating physician, you order a rapid infusion of intravenous saline with 5% dextrose. You wonder if the dextrose is really necessary.

A 30 year old male is brought to the emergency department following the ingestion of MDMA on a night out. He presents with a temperature of 41 degrees C, rigidity and severe agitation. He is diagnosed with serotonin syndrome and sedated with diazepam. Ice packing is used to attempt patient cooling, however his temperature continues to rise. You consider whether or not dantrolene would reduce the likelihood of patient mortality.

A 30 year old male is brought to the emergency department following the ingestion of multiple ecstasy pills on a night out. He initially presents with a temperature of 40°C, impaired consciousness and muscle rigidity. He is diagnosed with serotonin syndrome, sedated with benzodiazepines and treated with ice packs. However, his temperature continues to rise. You consider whether olanzapine or chlorpromazine would be beneficial for the patient.

A 30 year old male is brought to the emergency department following the ingestion of MDMA on a night out. He presents with a temperature of 40°C, rigidity and aggression. Following chemical restraint by diazepam, he is diagnosed with serotonin syndrome. As a your team attempt to manage his hyperkalaemic state, his temperature continues to rise and you consider whether or not administering cyproheptadine would reduce the risk of patient mortality.

A female patient presents at the emergency department, following the apparent ingestion of ecstasy in a night club. She appears confused and severely agitated, with tachycardia and a temperature of 40°C. The patient begins seizing, which is controlled with benzodiazepines, but as her temperature continues to rise, you consider which method may be best for cooling the patient.

A 23 year old man went on a skitrip in an extreme cold and windy environment. He protected his face against cold injuries by applying of a protecting emollient, but he got frostbite in the face anyway. When arriving at the emergency department, he asks you whether the use of emollients isn’t a good protection against frostbites.

75 year-old-gentleman from the old age residential home presented with acute breathlessness since 2 hours ago. He has a background of COPD, IHD, HT and CVA. The patient was too symptomatic to volunteer any history. Only very limited information was obtained from the carer from the residential home. ABG showed type 2 respiratory failure. The portable CXR machine was still on its way. You wonder if any further useful information can be obtained from bedside lung ultrasound assessment to help you quickly decide the treatment plan in the high dependency unit.

A 66 year old man presents to emergency department with cough, shortness of breath and pedal oedema. Clinical examination reveals bilateral fine basal crepitations. You wonder if he has got pneumonia or cardiac failure. He has a background history of cardiovascular risk factors.

A 55 year old female presents to the ED with the complaint of fever, chills, weakness. Upon presentation she appears pale Vitals are Temp 39, HR 105, RR 22 and WBC count 13,000. Given this patient meets SIRS criteria, will a procalcitonin level accurately diagnose serious bacterial infection?

A 69 year old man presents to the emergency department with epigastric pain that radiates to the back. He has been vomiting and has a fever. You suspect acute pancreatitis and wish to predict disease severity in order to start appropriate treatment.

A 29-year-old pregnant lady at 26 weeks of gestation, attends to the Emergency Department with painful swollen leg. An ultrasound evaluation showed no evidence of deep vein thrombosis, she was subsequently discharged with analgesics. She returned 5 days later with severe respiratory distress and an evaluation by CT PE showed bilateral pulmonary embolism