All posts by The Trauma Pro

Abdomen

Options For Hemorrhage Control From Pelvic Fracture

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We’ve come a long way in our available treatments to slow or stop bleeding from pelvic fractures. Let’s work our way through the list in today’s post, then look critically at two of the newcomers in the next one.

Pelvic binders. Long ago, these were just sheets wrapped around the patient and secured with clamps.

They were rather crude, as you can see. So of course, several enterprising companies began to offer commercial binders that were easier to place and secure.

Of note in the photo above, the wrap on the left is totally wrong. It is too wide and extends too high, so will not provide effective compression. The image on the right shows proper placement low across the greater trochanters. It is also not secured using metal clamps which may interfere with x-ray imaging.

External fixation of the pelvis. This usually involved a call to your friendly orthopedic surgeon. It could be applied in either the trauma bay or the operating room.

This image also shows improper technique. The horizontal bar should be angulated downwards over the pubis so it will not interfere with the trauma surgeon’s approach to laparotomy.

Internal pelvic packing + internal iliac artery ligation. Since surgeons didn’t have many other good tools, they could actually operate! Unfortunately, neither of these worked terribly well. The laparotomy pads could decompress upwards out of the pelvis and the internal iliac arteries have lots of collateral branches that permit ongoing bleeding from pelvic bones.

Angioembolization. Arterial bleeding from the pelvis occurs more often than you think (upwards of 50% of major pelvic injuries). Angiography and embolization can work very well. Unfortunately they are not suitable for unstable patients since IR suites are poor resuscitation areas. Many trauma centers do not have hybrid operating rooms where hemodynamically compromised patients can be taken for combined IR and open procedures if needed. So unstable patients must go to a regular OR first to attempt stabilization.

Preperitoneal packing. This is the new OR procedure kid on the block. Instead of placing packs in the pelvis, they are placed next to the broken pelvic bones but just outside the peritoneum. This permits better tamponade, and the intraperitoneal viscera push out against the packs to help decrease bleeding.

Zone 3 REBOA. And this is the very newest kid on the block. The balloon tipped catheter is inserted to a level above the aortic bifurcation but below the visceral and renal vessels. This is essentially a non-selective, temporary ligation of not just the internal iliac arteries, but everything distal to the aorta. It can be performed in the ED to dramatically slow blood loss, providing more time to get the patient to the OR where more definitive hemorrhage control can be provided (using many of the above techniques).

In my next post, I’ll take a closer look at the effectiveness of preperitoneal packing vs angioembolization.

Guidelines

Best Practice: Use of CT Scan In Trauma Activations – Part 2

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In my last post, I described how the unscheduled and random use of CT scan in trauma activations can interfere with normal radiology department workflow, creating access problems for other emergency and elective patients. Today, I’ll detail a project implemented at my hospital to analyze the magnitude of this problem and try to resolve it.

We started with a detailed analysis of how the scanner was being used for trauma activation patients. Regions Hospital has a single-tier trauma activation system, with no mechanism of injury criteria other than penetrating injury to the head, neck, and torso. There were usually about 850highest-level activations per year at the time, and traditionally the CT scanner had been “locked down” when the activation is announced. The CT techs would complete the current study on the table, then hold the scanner open until called or released by the trauma team.

Since we are a predominantly blunt trauma institution, we scan most stable patients. Our average time in the trauma bay is a bit less than 20 minutes. Add this time to the trauma activation prenotification time of up to 10 minutes, and the scanner has the potential to sit idle for up to half an hour. And in some cases when scan is not needed (minor injuries, rapid transport to OR) the techs were not notified and were not aware they could continue scanning their scheduled cases.

A multidisciplinary group was created and started with direct observation of the trauma activation process and a review of chart documentation and radiology logs. On average it was calculated that the scanner was held idle for an average of 17.9 minutes too long. This is more than enough time to complete one, or even two studies!

A new process was implemented that required the trauma team leader to call out to the ED clerk placing orders for the resuscitation 5 minutes before the patient would be ready for scan. I still remember the first time this happened to me. I was so used to just packing up and heading to scan, I got a little irritated when told that I hadn’t made the 5-minute call. But it’s a good feedback loop, and I never forgot again!

We studied our workflow and results over a 9-week period. And here are the factoids:

  • The average CT idle time for trauma activations before the project was 17.9 minutes
  • This decreased to an average idle time of 6.4 minutes during the pilot project
  • Total idle time for all activations was 8.3 hours, but would have been 36 hours under the old system
  • A total of 28.6 hours were freed up, which allowed an additional 114 patients to be scanned while waiting for the trauma activation patients

This was deemed a success, and the 5-minute rule is now part of the routine flow of our trauma activations. We rarely ever have to wait for CT, and if we do it’s usually due to the team leader not thinking ahead.

Bottom line: This illustrates the processes that should be used when a quality problem surfaces in your program:

  • Recognize that there is a problem
  • Convene a small group of experts to consider the nuances
  • Generate objective data that describes the problem in detail
  • Put on your thinking caps to come up with creative solutions
  • Test the solutions until you find one that shows the desired improvement
  • Be prepared to modify your new systems over time to ensure they continue to meet your needs
Guidelines

Best Practice: Use of CT Scan In Trauma Activations – Part 1

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Computed tomography is an essential part of the diagnostic workup for many trauma patients. However, it’s a limited resource in most hospitals. Only so many scanners are affordable and available.  Typically, trauma centers have a scanner located in or very near the trauma bay, which makes physical access easy. Others may be located farther away, which can pose logistical and safety issues for critically injured patients.

Even if the CT is close to the ED, availability can be an issue. This availability applies not only to trauma scans, but to others as well. There is an expectation that CT be immediately available when needed for trauma activation patients. However, chances are that the same scanner is also used for high priority scans for services other than trauma, such as stroke evaluation.

Who gets the scanner first? Obviously, many trauma patients need rapid diagnosis for treatment of their serious injuries. But a fresh stroke patient also has a neurologic recovery countdown clock running if they might be eligible for lytic administration.

And don’t forget that trauma and stroke aren’t the only services vying for that scanner. The hospital undoubtedly has a stream of elective scans queued up for other in-house patients. Every urgent or emergent scan needed for trauma sets the elective schedule back another 30 minutes or more.

How does your trauma center manage CT scan usage for trauma? The vast majority essentially lock it down at some fixed point. This is typically either upon trauma activation, or at patient arrival. The former is very common, but also very wasteful because there can be a significant wait for the patient to actually arrive. Then add on the time it takes to complete the trauma bay evaluation. Up to an hour may pass, with no throughput in the CT scanner. This can be a major work flow headache for your radiology department.

Is there another way? My center was one of those that stopped the scanner after the current patient was finished at the time the trauma activation was called. We have two scanners just 30 feet from the trauma bays, so one could continue working while the other was held. However, this cut their throughput by 50% for roughly half an hour. We recognized that this was a creating a problem for the whole hospital, so we worked with the radiology department to come up with a better way.

In my next post I’ll detail the new system we implemented, and provide data showing the real impact of this new system on CT scan productivity.

What the heck?

What The Heck?! The Answer!

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In my last post, I described an elderly pedestrian struck by a car. During the trauma activation, routine chest and pelvic x-rays were obtained. Here was the pelvic image:

Note the odd oval densities across the center of the x-ray. What the heck? What are they?

There are two choices: they are either inside or outside the patient. We had already removed her clothes, so it wasn’t something she was carrying. And if it was inside, we would be able to identify it on the CT scan we had ordered.

But in this case, the x-ray was done early in the secondary survey. Specifically, we did it before we rolled our patient and examined her back.  When we did, here is what we found:

Only it wasn’t in the box. Or on her neck. This one was stuck on her lower back, but not in her clothes. She was suffering from lower back pain, and applied one of these on a daily basis for comfort. We had not rolled the patient prior to the pelvic x-ray.

The pods on these thermal wraps contain a mixture of iron, sodium chloride, sodium thiosulfate, water, charcoal, and sodium polyacrylate that heat up when removed from their package and exposed to oxygen. The iron renders it somewhat radio-opaque, hence their appearance on the x-ray. We did peel it off prior to CT since it would probably create a significant amount of scatter which would degrade the image.

Should we have waited a few more minutes to get the image until we had rolled and examined the back? This is a judgment call. Since our trauma team moves quickly, we are typically ready to head to the scanner in 15 minutes. In order to improve overall CT scan throughput, we have adopted a 5-minute advance notice policy.  To accomplish this, we don’t want to wait until the very end of the resuscitation to get x-rays. That would end up slowing down our process.

You may feel differently about the timing of the images, or you may have a different method of sequencing your CT scanner. Whatever works best for you. But remember, all trauma patients need to be completely undressed and all of their surfaces, nooks, and crannies inspected before they leave the emergency department!

What the heck?

What The Heck?!

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Here’s an interesting case from my image archives.

An elderly female pedestrian was struck by a car. She was hemodynamically stable. During the course of her evaluation as a trauma activation, her clothes were completely removed. (She was kept nice and warm with infrared warmers.)

Early in the secondary survey, chest and pelvic x-rays were obtained. Here is the pelvis image:

What is wrong in this picture?? Leave comments below or tweet your guesses. I’ll publish the answer Friday.