The American journal of emergency medicine
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Case Reports
Usage of airway ultrasound as an assessment and prediction tool of a difficult airway management.
Airway assessment is important in emergency airway management. A difficult airway can lead to life-threatening complications. A perfect airway assessment tool does not exist and unanticipated difficulty will remain unforeseen. ⋯ Ultrasound predictors of the difficult airway include the inability to visualize the hyoid bone, short hyomental distance ratio, high pretracheal anterior neck thickness and large tongue size. Besides airway assessment, ultrasound can also help to predict endotracheal tube size, confirm intubation and guide emergency airway procedures such as cricothyroidotomy and tracheostomy. Point of care ultrasound of the upper airway can be used in airway assessment to identify distorted airway anatomy, pathological lesions and guide treatment decisions.
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Observational Study
The association between L1 skeletal muscle index derived from routine CT and in-hospital mortality in CAP patients in the ED.
Low muscle mass is associated with an increased mortality risk due to medical comorbidities such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cardiovascular disease, and cerebrovascular disease. Computed tomography (CT) has been identified as the gold standard for measuring body composition. We evaluated the relationship between the L1 SMI measured from CT and in-hospital mortality in patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). ⋯ SMI assessment at L1 is achievable in patients with CAP receiving routine chest CT, and the L1 SMI is associated with high in-hospital mortality, more hospitalizations and ventilator application in patients with CAP in the ED. This could help establish an early strategy for critical care of patients with L1 SMI obtained by chest CT for diagnosis in CAP patients in the ED.
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A mycotic aneurysm is a life-threatening disease that usually presents with nonspecific symptoms. A prompt diagnosis is essential because of the risk of aneurysm rupture and high mortality rate. We describe a case of an abdominal mycotic aortic aneurysm presenting as chronic constipation for 3 weeks, without fever or abdominal pain. Point-of-care ultrasound has the ability to detect silent abdominal aortic aneurysms and serves as a follow-up tool for patients under medical treatment.