recent articles

EM MINDSET

One Physician's Advice to the New Grad

To the Class of 2015 – Congratulations!! You’ve made it. After at least 11 years of post-high school education, you have finally reached that proverbial finish line and are ready to transition from resident to attending. What I would like to share with you is some advice about what life is like on the other side. Now that you have finished residency, it’s safe to say that you know the medicine really well. But, I have come to find that your learning about life as a professional is just beginning.

FOAMED

Outpatient Treatment of Pulmonary Embolism

A 64 year-old woman with past medical history of diabetes mellitus type 2 that is well-controlled on insulin, hypertension, and asthma presents with 1 week of shortness of breath and cough productive of blood-tinged sputum. The shortness of breath became suddenly worse about an hour ago as she was walking into your emergency department for evaluation and at that time she had symptoms of pre-syncope. She is denying chest pain, palpitations, diaphoresis, nausea, recent travel, or surgery. The patient takes both a beta-blocker and a calcium channel blocker to control her hypertension. She took all of her medications this morning prior to presentation. The patient has no personal history of cancer and there is no significant family history. She denies the use of tobacco, alcohol, or any other drugs.

practice updates

HSV Encephalitis

HSV encephalitis: EM-focused review Author: Carla Sterling, MD (EM Resident Physician, SUNY Downstate Medical Center) // Edited by: Jennifer Robertson, MD and Alex Koyfman, MD (@EMHighAK) Case (changed from original)9: A 56 year-old female with no significant past medical, psychiatric or family history is brought in to the emergency department (ED) by relatives. The family […]