Category Archives: General

General

But The Radiologist Made Me Do It!

Leave a comment

The radiologist made me order that (unnecessary) test! I’ve heard this excuse many, many times. Do these phrases look familiar?

  1. … recommend clinical correlation
  2. … correlation with CT may be of value
  3. … recommend delayed CT imaging through the area
  4. … may represent thymus vs thoracic aortic injury (in a 2 year old who fell down stairs)
Some trauma professionals will read the radiology report and then immediately order more xrays. Others will critically look at the report, the patient’s clinical status and mechanism of injury, and then decide they are not necessary. I am firmly in the latter camp.
But why do some just follow the rad’s suggestions? I believe there are two major camps:
  • Those that are afraid of being sued if they don’t do everything suggested, because they’ve done everything and shouldn’t miss the diagnosis
  • Those that don’t completely understand what is known about trauma mechanisms and injury and think the radiologist does
Bottom line: The radiologist is your consultant. While they are good at reading images, they do not know the nuances of trauma. Plus, they didn’t get to see the patient so they don’t have the full context for their read. First, talk to the rad so they know what happened to the patient and what you are looking for. Then critically look at their read. If the mechanism doesn’t support the diagnosis, or they are requesting unusual or unneeded studies, don’t get them! Just document your rationale clearly in the record. This provides best patient care, and minimizes the potential complications (and radiation exposure) from unnecessary tests.
Related post:

Reference: Pitfalls of the vague radiology report. AJR 174(6):1511-1518, 2000.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
General

The Medical Orthopaedic Trauma Service

Leave a comment

Our population is aging, and falls continue to be a leading cause of injury and morbidity in the elderly. Unfortunately, many elders have significant medical conditions that make them more likely to suffer unfortunate complications from their injuries and the procedures that repair them.

More and more hospitals around the world are applying a more multidisciplinary approach than the traditional model. One example is the Medical Orthopaedic Trauma Service (MOTS) at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. Any elderly patient who has suffered a fracture is seen in the ED by both an emergency physician and a hospitalist from the MOTS team. Once in the hospital, the hospitalist and orthopaedic surgeon try to determine the reason for the fall, assess for risk factors such as osteoporosis, provide comprehensive medical management, provide pain control, and of course, fix the fracture.

This medical center published a paper looking at their success with this model. They retrospectively reviewed 306 patients with femur fractures involving the greater trochanter. They looked at complications, length of stay, readmission rate and post-discharge mortality. No change in length of stay was noted, but there were significantly fewer complications, specifically catheter associated urinary tract infections and arrhythmias. The readmission rate was somewhat shorter in the MOTS group, but did not quite achieve significance with regression analysis.

Bottom line: This type of multidisciplinary approach to these fragile patients makes sense. Hospitalists, especially those with geriatric experience, can have a significant impact on the safety and outcomes of these patients. But even beyond this, all trauma professionals need to look for and correct the reasons for the fall, not just fix the bones and send our elders home. This responsibility starts in the field with prehospital providers, and continues with hospital through the entire inpatient stay.

Related post:

Reference: The medical orthopaedic service (MOTS): an innovative multidisciplinary team model that decreases in-hospital complications in patients with hip fractures. J Orthopaedic Trauma 26(6):379-383, 2012.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
General

What Is: Bucket Handle Injury Of The Intestine

Leave a comment

A bucket handle injury is a type of mesenteric injury of the intestine. The intestine itself separates from the mesentery, leaving a devascularized segment of bowel that looks like the handle on a bucket (get it?).

These injuries can occur after blunt trauma to the abdomen. The force required is rather extreme, so the usual mechanism is motor vehicle crash. In theory, it could occur after a fall from a significant height, and I have seen one case from a wood fragment that was hurled at the abdomen by a malfunctioning lathe.

The mechanics of this injury are related to fixed vs mobile structures in the abdomen. Injuries tend to occur adjacent to areas of the intestine that are fixed, such as the cecum, ligament of Treitz, colonic flexures and rectum. During sudden deceleration, portions of the intestine adjacent to these areas continue to move, pulling on the nearby attachments. This causes the intestine itself to pull off of its mesentery.

Source: personal archive. Not treated at Regions Hospital

The picture above shows multiple bucket handle injuries in one patient. There are 3 injuries in the small bowel, and one involving the entire transverse colon. Note the obviously devascularized segment at the bottom center of the photo.

The terminal ileum is the most common site for bucket handle tears. Proximal jejunum, transverse colon, and sigmoid colon are other possible areas. In my experience, the driver is more likely to sustain an injury to the terminal ileum, and the front passenger to the sigmoid. I think this is due to the location of the buckle, but it’s just my own observation.

Always think about the possibility of this injury in patients with very high speed deceleration. Seat belt marks have a particularly high association with this injury. If your patient has an abnormal exam in the right lower quadrant, or if the CT shows unusual changes there (“dirty” mesenteric fat, thickened bowel wall, extravasation), I recommend a trip to the OR. In these cases, an injury will nearly always be present. And since the affected intestine may take a few days to die and leak, look for an unexplained rise in WBC beginning on hospital day 2.

Related posts:

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
General

ACS Trauma Abstracts #1: REBOA! (And CT???)

Leave a comment

This paper is from the group at ShockTrauma in Baltimore, who are really pushing the envelope of REBOA. We always worry about distal ischemia after balloon inflation, because the ischemia produced can be detrimental to the gut and lower extremities. This group was curious about what the flow patterns looked like with  inflation of the balloon. So in select cases, they obtained CT scans with contrast in patients while the balloon was fully inflated (!!).

They reviewed their experience over a four year period, looking at patients receiving a CT scan with the REBOA balloon partially or fully inflated.

Here are the factoids:

  • Nine patients were included. This makes sense because unstable patients should not go to CT scan, so this should be a very limited group.
  • Mean injury severity score (ISS) was 48, which makes sense. These patients are hurt bad!
  • Four patients had supraceliac REBOA (aortic zone I) and five had infrarenal (zone III)
  • Contrast was seen below the REBOA balloon in all patients, and was seen distal to the insertion site in half
  • Collateral flow around the balloon was identified in all patients

Bottom line: The authors found that REBOA decreased blood flow to the distal aorta, but certainly did not stop it. Collateral flow is underestimated, and probably provides a protective effect for the viscera and other structures while inflated. This is good news for REBOA proponents, because it suggests that placement may not cause as much risk from ischemia as originally thought.

But why oh why did they have to go to  CT in the first place?

Reference: Assessment of blood flow patterns distal to aortic occlusion (AO) using computed tomography in patients with resuscitative endovascular balloon occlusion of the aorta. JACS 225(4S1):S50, 2017.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
General

Best Of: Abstracts From The American College of Surgeons

Leave a comment

The annual Clinical Congress for the American College of Surgeons will be held at the end of the month. A large number of research papers are presented there, and a smaller subset are related to trauma and critical care.

I’m going to spend the next week and a half or so reviewing many of the ones I believe are the most promising. Keep in mind that these are works in progress, and that many will never see the light of print. I’ll take them apart, trying to see how good each one is. Some are very good, some are hopelessly flawed.

I hope you enjoy the analysis! Let’s see if we learn something new along the way.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email