Near hanging presenting to an accident and emergency department.

Victims of near hanging are being increasingly seen in accident and emergency (A&E) department. This paper reports on seven cases of near hanging seen over four years in a district general hospital. The mechanism of injury is ligature strangulation rather than cervical spinal cord injury. All cases of near hanging should be actively and vigorously resuscitated, as initial presenting features bear a poor correlation to eventual outcome.     

Neuralgic amyotrophy presenting to an accident and emergency department.

Two patients with neuralgic amyotrophy (Parsonage-Turner syndrome) are described. Problems arising from the shoulder girdle commonly present to accident and emergency (A&E) departments. Neuralgic amyotrophy is an infrequent neuromuscular disorder which predominantly affects the shoulder girdle. Characterised by severe pain followed by muscle weakness, atrophy, and variable sensory deficits, the diagnosis is based on history and physical findings and is confirmed by electromyography. The prognosis is excellent and treatment is supportive using analgesia and physiotherapy.     

A case of muscle abscess presenting to an accident and emergency department.

A case is reported of a patient with acute primary muscle abscess who presented to the accident and emergency department with hip pain. Pyomyositis must be considered as a cause of muscle pain especially around the hip. A brief discussion of the diagnosis and management of pyomyositis is also presented.     

Intussusception presenting to a paediatric accident and emergency department.

In a retrospective study, 110 patients episodes with intussusception presenting to a paediatric accident and emergency (A&E) department were reviewed, with particular attention being paid to presenting symptoms, time to diagnosis, radiological investigation, management and outcome. Between 1983 and 1993 100 patients presented to this department with 110 episodes of intussusception. Delay in diagnosis of greater than 12 h from initial medical contact was associated with increased morbidity. Associated factors in delayed diagnosis were departure from the classical symptoms (pain, vomiting and blood per rectum) and the presence of diarrhoea. General practitioner (GP) referral was to the medical team (rather than the surgical team) in around 50% of cases. Irrespective of the specialty of the first hospital doctor to see the patient only 42% were diagnosed correctly within 3 h of admission. In this population diarrhoea is a common symptom of intussusception and should alert the clinician rather than reassure. Because of its many presentations and relative rarity, intussusception remains a difficult condition to diagnose.     

Occupational accidents presenting to the accident and emergency department.

A prospective survey of patients attending the major Accident and Emergency Department in Aberdeen was undertaken. This department serves a population of 500,000 and sees some 50% of all accidents in the region. All work-related injuries were identified and information relating to the circumstances of the accident, injury sustained, and treatment required was sought. Work-related injuries accounted for 16.5% of new patients attending the department. The commonest injury type was a laceration to a finger. Three hundred and eighty diagnostic X-rays were undertaken and a total of 910 treatments were required over a 27-day period. On an annual basis, it is estimated that some 5100 radiographs and 12,300 medical treatments would be required for work-related accidents. It is estimated that 30% of injuries to the hands and feet would have been prevented by the wearing of appropriate personal protective equipment. The majority of workplace accidents were correctly referred to A&E and any efforts to reduce this workload must concentrate on preventive measures in the workplace. This paper suggests that documenting work-related accidents and determining targets for preventive action would reduce the number of attendances at A&E units with a potential significant saving for industry and the National Health Service.     

Improving detection of alcohol misuse in patients presenting to an accident and emergency department

Objectives—To assess and improve deployment of a brief test for alcohol misuse: the Paddington Alcohol Test (PAT).

Design—Prospective study of the effects of audit feedback.

Setting—An urban accident and emergency department.

Subjects—Senior house officers (SHO) (n = 13).

Outcome measurements—PAT use and categorisation of patients for each SHO; observational analysis of presenting complaints according to PAT.

Results—1062 of 1737 patients (61.1%) were defined as PAT possible—that is, presented with ≥ one complaint listed on the PAT test proforma. In month 1, PAT uptake was poor. PAT use improved significantly when feedback was instituted (p<0.0001). The response to audit and feedback showed marked inter-SHO variation. When feedback was withdrawn (month 4), there was a significant reduction in PAT use (p=0.003). Three other indices of detection followed this trend: (a) number of PAT positive patients identified, (b) proportion of PAT possible patients identified as PAT positive, and (c) number of PAT positive patients referred to the alcoholic health worker. The 10 most common PAT positive categories, accounting for 77% of all PAT positive complaints were: fall > collapse (including "fit", "blackout") > head injury (including "facial injury") > assault (including "domestic violence" and `other') > non-specific gastrointestinal problem > "unwell" > psychiatric (including "depression", "overdose", "confusion") > cardiac (including "chest pain" and "palpitations") > self neglect > repeat attendance.

Conclusions—Ongoing audit with feedback improves both PAT use and detection of alcohol misuse. The PAT is now simpler including only 10 conditions, which should further aid its use.

     

Diphtheria presenting in the accident and emergency department.

A case of diphtheria encountered in the accident and emergency department is described. In addition, 38 cases of diphtheria have been analysed, and demonstrate that, although now rare in this country, the disease still exists and its clinical features remain unchanged. It presents almost as often in the accident and emergency department as it does to the general practitioner and remains overwhelmingly a disease of children. Diphtheria is still a notifiable disease. The diagnosis must be made clinically and appropriate action taken before the bacteriological confirmation is received. This prevents unnecessary delay in treatment and makes contact tracing less arduous.     

Investigation and management of patients with pleuritic chest pain presenting to the accident and emergency department.

The assessment of a patient with pleuritic chest pain calls for a high degree of clinical acumen and a high degree of suspicion that the diagnosis might be pulmonary embolism. This area is one of the most difficult in A&E medicine (and indeed chest medicine). One error is to "think the best" when considering the diagnosis in such patients but experience soon teaches to "think PE" and diagnose less serious conditions only when pulmonary embolism has been excluded. A key consideration is the presence of risk factors. Because the diagnosis is difficult, there should be no hesitation in requesting a senior opinion or referring to the inpatient medical team. We have produced an algorithm (fig 1) for the investigation and management of pleuritic chest pain as discussed in this article. Three questions relating to this article are: (1) Can pulmonary embolism be the diagnosis in a patient with pleuritic chest pain but a normal chest radiograph, ECG, and arterial blood gases? (2) What is the chest radiograph abnormality which is most likely to alert you to the possibility of pulmonary embolism? (3) What percentage of patients with a low clinical suspicion of pulmonary embolism but a high probability V/Q scan will have pulmonary embolism demonstrated on pulmonary angiography? The three key references are The PIOPED Investigators, Dalen, and Fennerty.     

Physiotherapy in an accident and emergency department

This paper examines the role of a full-time physiotherapist in a busy Accident and Emergency department. It describes the service offered and concludes with an example of the management of a patient with an RTA related neck sprain.     

Weever fish stings: a report of two cases presenting to an accident and emergency department.

Two patients are described who suffered weever fish stings and presented to an accident and emergency department. The characteristic symptoms and treatment are described.     

Audit of upper limb fracture management in an accident and emergency department.

The objective of this study was to audit the initial management of patients with upper limb fractures, and to determine whether the accident and emergency (A&E) management of fractures is improved by using guidelines for treatment and referral. This was achieved by comparing the standard of treatment, as determined by fracture clinic doctors, before and after the introduction of fracture treatment guidelines in the A&E department of a London teaching hospital. A total of 326 patients seen in the department and referred to the fracture clinic over two 2-month periods were included in the audit. The first audit revealed some error in 69/215 (32.1%) referrals and 51/215 (23.7%) of these were potentially liable to increased morbidity. After introducing the guidelines the total errors fell to 14/111 (12.6%) patients referred, of which only eight patients (7.2%) were at risk of increased morbidity. This represents an overall improvement of 19.5% [95% confidence interval (CI) 12.3 to 29.7%] and a 16.5% (95% CI 9.1 to 23.9%) reduction in the potentially more significant errors. Hence, the use of audit and implementation of simple guidelines for fracture management in an A&E department improves the standard of treatment.