The American journal of emergency medicine
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Hemorrhagic ascites due to endometriosis is an exceedingly uncommon diagnosis rarely reported in the medical literature. We present a case of a 27-year-old woman who presented to the emergency department for flank and neck pain and was found to be hypotensive with massive hemorrhagic ascites and severe anemia. ⋯ A paracentesis of more than 4000 mL of bloody ascitic fluid revealed no evidence of cancer, and she was discharged on hospital day 3 with hormone therapy and no recurrence of symptoms upon outpatient follow-up. This case illustrates the clinical management, diagnostic approach, and underlying etiology of an infrequent but life-threatening complication of endometriosis.
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Mild head injury (MHI) is a common clinical problem in emergency departments (EDs). Long-standing debate is still going on about MHI in the elderly: current guidelines recommend to perform a CT scan on this group. ⋯ Our retrospective analyses demonstrated that the incidence of intracranial complications after MHI is not different from that of the general population, and based on this finding, a CT does not seem to be necessary, at least up to 80 years old. Our data suggest that antiplatelet therapy could be a significant risk factor. Our results suggest that elderly patients between 65 and 79 years old without risk factors could be managed as younger patients.
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Traumatic dislocation of the metatarsophalangeal joint of an isolated lesser toe is an uncommon injury. We report a patient who presented 1 day after a dorsiflexion injury of the right foot. Physical examination showed a shortened and angulated right fourth toe resulting in scissoring of his digits. ⋯ Reduction of the metatarsophalangeal of an isolated lesser toe is difficult due to the anatomical constraints imposed by the surrounding soft tissue. Failure at reduction after a single attempt by an experienced emergency physician should prompt the need for an orthopedic consult in view of likely surgery required. Avascular necrosis of the metatarsal head can also occur as a late complication after such injury.
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The aim of the present study was, first, to evaluate the prognostic value of mid-regional proadrenomedullin (proADM) in emergency department (ED) patients with a diagnosis of community acquired pneumonia (CAP) and, second, to analyze the added value of proADM as a risk stratification tool in comparison with other biomarkers and clinical severity scores. We evaluated proADM, C-reactive protein and procalcitonin, along with the Pneumonia Severity Index (PSI) score in consecutive CAP patients. Ability to predict 30-day mortality was assessed using receiver operating characteristic curve analysis, logistic regression, and reclassification metrics for all patients and for patients with high PSI scores. ⋯ ROC(AUC) (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve) was higher for proADM than for PSI score (ROC(AUC) [95% CI], 0.810 [0.654-0.965] and 0.669 [0.445-0.893] respectively). Reclassification analysis revealed that combination of PSI and proADM allows a better risk assessment than PSI alone (P = .001). MR-proADM may be helpful in individual risk stratification of CAP patients with a high PSI score in the ED, allowing to a better identification of patients at risk of death.
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Discoloration of urine can be alarming and may indicate a serious underlying pathology. However, majority is benign and occur as a result of ingestions of substances such as medications or food dye or trauma postinstrumentations. ⋯ Unfortunately, most clinicians including the frontline clinicians are not aware of this syndrome, and despite the striking features, purple urine bag discoloration may be overlooked and not be given appropriate treatment. We present a case of this rare phenomenon with urosepsis that was not diagnosed on 2 occasions when the patient presented to the accident and emergency department.