Articles related to Emergency Medicine

An 87-year-old white man presented to a hospital emergency surgical department with two round, grayish-brown nodules on his abdomen. He had no other complaints except feeling tired and dizzy for the last few months. He had a 120 pack-year smoking history but was not taking any medications and had not experienced a cough, chest pain, shortness of breath, or other breathing problems.

Follow this case study of a 71-year-old man found to have significant, asymptomatic hypokalemia discovered in routine outpatient lab work. How would you manage this patient?

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warns that the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in the US continued to rise during the first year of the pandemic. For the first time in seven years, the overall number of reported STD cases was lower than the previous year, but the CDC attributed the drop-off to a decline in reported cases of chlamydia — the nation’s most common STD — that was likely a result of pandemic-related interruptions to screening.

New guidelines recommend that internists treat uncomplicated diverticulitis in an outpatient setting without the use of antibiotics. The new guidelines on diagnosis and management of patients with diverticulitis have been published by the Annals of Internal Medicine. And they are stirring up debate among physicians.

A class action lawsuit against TeamHealth has concluded with a $15 million award settlement to be shared by some 3,000 emergency physicians in almost every US state. The doctors named in the court case alleged that TeamHealth, one of the nation’s largest medical staffing companies with 15,000 physicians, and its subsidiary Paragon Contracting Services, LLC, were in breach of their contracts and secretly cheated doctors out of a portion of the bonuses they were promised. The physicians claimed that their contracts required TeamHealth to pay them a bonus when they supervised care provided by a physician assistant, nurse practitioner, or other advanced practice provider (APP), but that did not happen.

An interesting case study in BRASH (bradycardia, renal failure, atrioventricular blockade, shock, and hyperkalemia) syndrome highlights Rare Disease Day, which took place on 2/28/22. After reviewing the patient’s history and symptoms, would you agree on the diagnosis?