The Chief Complaint


Book Description

A handbook for physicians, residents and students in the emergency department to help manage patients. Evidence based concise algorithms.




How We Do Harm


Book Description

A startling and important exposé on the state of medicine, research, and healthcare today by the Chief Medical and Scientific Officer of the American Cancer Society How We Do Harm exposes the underbelly of healthcare today—the overtreatment of the rich, the under treatment of the poor, the financial conflicts of interest that determine the care that physicians' provide, insurance companies that don't demand the best (or even the least expensive) care, and pharmaceutical companies concerned with selling drugs, regardless of whether they improve health or do harm. Dr. Otis Brawley is the chief medical and scientific officer of The American Cancer Society, an oncologist with a dazzling clinical, research, and policy career. How We Do Harm pulls back the curtain on how medicine is really practiced in America. Brawley tells of doctors who select treatment based on payment they will receive, rather than on demonstrated scientific results; hospitals and pharmaceutical companies that seek out patients to treat even if they are not actually ill (but as long as their insurance will pay); a public primed to swallow the latest pill, no matter the cost; and rising healthcare costs for unnecessary—and often unproven—treatments that we all pay for. Brawley calls for rational healthcare, healthcare drawn from results-based, scientifically justifiable treatments, and not just the peddling of hot new drugs. Brawley's personal history – from a childhood in the gang-ridden streets of black Detroit, to the green hallways of Grady Memorial Hospital, the largest public hospital in the U.S., to the boardrooms of The American Cancer Society—results in a passionate view of medicine and the politics of illness in America - and a deep understanding of healthcare today. How We Do Harm is his well-reasoned manifesto for change.




Chief Complaint


Book Description

At 57 years old, John Kerastas thought he was the poster child for fifty-year old healthiness: he competed in triathlons, rode in 100 mile biking events and ate a healthy diet chock full of organic vegetables. Then he discovered that he had a brain tumor the size of his wife's fist. His memoir chronicles the first year he spent addressing tumor-related health issues: preparing for his first operation, discovering a dangerous skull infection, having the infected portion of his skull surgically removed, learning about his substantial vision and cognitive losses, undergoing rehab and radiation treatments, and learning to live with his "new normal." According to Kerastas, the phrase "new normal" is the medical community's code words for "You're alive, so quit complaining." As his health changed, so did his sense of humor. He writes that his humor started out superficially light-hearted prior to the first operation; transmogrified into gallows humor after several subsequent operations; and leveled out as somewhat wry-ish after radiation and rehab. This is a surprisingly upbeat and inspiring book for anybody interested in memoirs about people dealing with personal crises, for patients trudging through rehab, for caretakers helping victims of serious illnesses, or for anybody looking for an unexpected chuckle from an unlikely subject. JOHN KERASTAS has worked at a global advertising agency, at several technology start-up companies and as a free-lance writer. Now, in addition to non-profit and charitable work, he spends his time blogging, speaking and writing about brain health, brain tumors and rehab. You can follow his blog or view his presentations schedule at www.johnstumor.blogspot.com.




101 Primary Care Case Studies


Book Description

Real-life primary care case studies* from more than 50 primary care providers, including physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and physicians! 101 Primary Care Case Studies offers real-life patient scenarios and critical thinking exercises to help you work through a patient’s chief complaint. Through narrative case studies, you will determine how best to diagnose, treat, and manage your patient based on the history of present illness, review of systems, relevant history, and physical examination findings. This workbook will ask probing questions to help you determine differential and most likely diagnoses, diagnostic tests to order, and appropriate patient management strategies using relevant and timely references to support your decisions. The organization of each case study simulates the patient care journey from chief complaint to outcome. Serving as a virtual clinical preceptor, this workbook can be used independently or in a classroom setting. It is accompanied by a robust online student supplement that provides answers to all questions, real outcomes of the cases, and valuable personal insights from the authors on how the patient was successfully managed. Not only will this workbook help you work through patient cases clinically, it will also share important, but often overlooked, bedside manner skills needed to successfully communicate with and care for your patients. Covering conditions across all organ systems and across the lifespan, this workbook is organized by chief complaint, providing an authentic perspective on what to expect in the patient care environment. It even includes information on pathophysiology and how to use ICD-10 and CPT (E/M) codes in your documentation. The book uniquely weaves together both the science and art of medicine by including personal insights into quality and compassionate care. Key Features Provides real-life patient cases from an interprofessional author team of physician assistants, nurse practitioners, and physicians Uses a templated case study design and critical thinking exercises to help you methodically work through various patient scenarios Teaches clinical and bedside manner skills imperative for delivering quality patient care Covers patients across the lifespan, including pediatric, adolescent, adult, and geriatric populations Offers additional insight on patient education, medical and legal concerns, and interprofessional collaboration Includes a robust online student supplement with valuable insights from the authors on how they successfully managed the cases Provides instructors with a table of contents that is filterable by chief complaint, diagnosis, patient population, and organ system *Details changed to protect patient information.




Formulating a Differential Diagnosis for the Advanced Practice Provider


Book Description

Praise for the First Edition: “Developing a comprehensive differential diagnosis for a specific complaint is a daunting task even for experienced advanced practice nurses. This user-friendly clinical guide provides a strategy and standard format for working through this complex task. It is a wonderful tool for both students and new advanced practice nurses...” -- 5 stars, Doody’s This easy-access clinical guide to over 70 commonly seen symptoms, written for advanced practice provider (APP) students and new practitioners, describes a step-by-step process for obtaining a reliable patient history, choosing the appropriate physical exam, and using the patient history and physical exam findings to form a differential diagnosis. The second edition continues to include the case study approach, and is updated to incorporate 22 new symptoms along with contributions by a new editor, who is a leader in holistic health. The guide is distinguished by several unique features including focused patient history questions and responses, Physical Exam Findings, a Differential Diagnosis Table (clearly comparing potential diagnostic choices based on symptoms), a Diagnostic Examination table (including estimated costs and codes), and a Case Study Summary highlighting the critical thinking process. Symptoms are presented alphabetically in a systematic, unfolding case study approach and include chief complaint, presenting history, past history, and explicit methodology for determining correct diagnosis. Key Features: Describes over 70 (22 new to the second edition) commonly presented symptoms with unfolding case scenarios Offers a step-by-step approach to building clinical decision-making skills Provides quick access to differential diagnosis, requisite diagnostic tests, and clinical-decision making Guides APP students and novice practitioners in conducting a problem-focused history and examination Includes unique Differential Diagnosis tables and Diagnostic Examinations tables that help clarify strategies for diagnostic decision making




Pediatric Complaints and Diagnostic Dilemmas


Book Description

Pediatric Complaints and Diagnostic Dilemmas: A Case-Based Approach contains 119 cases in 20 chapters that cover a common chief complaint. Each chapter opens with a definition of the complaint, moves to differential diagnosis with a table on the most frequent causes, and reviews the important questions in the history. Four to eight cases in each chapter illustrate how the same chief complaint can have different causes. Case presentations cover the history of present illness, past medical history, the physical exam, diagnostic studies, and the development of the complaint over time.




Basics of Emergency Medicine, 3rd Edition


Book Description

EMRA's convenient clinical guide equips you to handle the most common chief complaints efficiently and quickly throughout your shift. Use Basics of Emergency Medicine to ensure nothing is overlooked as you treat the adult patient population. This pocket-size guide is ideal for medical students, interns, off-service rotating residents, NPs, PAs, nurses ¿ and anyone caring for patients in the fast-paced world of emergency medicine.




An American Sickness


Book Description

A New York Times bestseller/Washington Post Notable Book of 2017/NPR Best Books of 2017/Wall Street Journal Best Books of 2017 "This book will serve as the definitive guide to the past and future of health care in America.”—Siddhartha Mukherjee, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies and The Gene At a moment of drastic political upheaval, An American Sickness is a shocking investigation into our dysfunctional healthcare system - and offers practical solutions to its myriad problems. In these troubled times, perhaps no institution has unraveled more quickly and more completely than American medicine. In only a few decades, the medical system has been overrun by organizations seeking to exploit for profit the trust that vulnerable and sick Americans place in their healthcare. Our politicians have proven themselves either unwilling or incapable of reining in the increasingly outrageous costs faced by patients, and market-based solutions only seem to funnel larger and larger sums of our money into the hands of corporations. Impossibly high insurance premiums and inexplicably large bills have become facts of life; fatalism has set in. Very quickly Americans have been made to accept paying more for less. How did things get so bad so fast? Breaking down this monolithic business into the individual industries—the hospitals, doctors, insurance companies, and drug manufacturers—that together constitute our healthcare system, Rosenthal exposes the recent evolution of American medicine as never before. How did healthcare, the caring endeavor, become healthcare, the highly profitable industry? Hospital systems, which are managed by business executives, behave like predatory lenders, hounding patients and seizing their homes. Research charities are in bed with big pharmaceutical companies, which surreptitiously profit from the donations made by working people. Patients receive bills in code, from entrepreneurial doctors they never even saw. The system is in tatters, but we can fight back. Dr. Elisabeth Rosenthal doesn't just explain the symptoms, she diagnoses and treats the disease itself. In clear and practical terms, she spells out exactly how to decode medical doublespeak, avoid the pitfalls of the pharmaceuticals racket, and get the care you and your family deserve. She takes you inside the doctor-patient relationship and to hospital C-suites, explaining step-by-step the workings of a system badly lacking transparency. This is about what we can do, as individual patients, both to navigate the maze that is American healthcare and also to demand far-reaching reform. An American Sickness is the frontline defense against a healthcare system that no longer has our well-being at heart.




Basics of Emergency Medicine


Book Description

Use this quick guide to help build your differential in the emergency department. Sorting by the most common chief complaints, we help you understand how to assess your patient, recognize clues to guide your clinical decision-making, and create an initial treatment plan. This is perfect for students, off-service rotating residents, other specialties covering an ED, NPs, PAs, nurses - anyone caring for patients in the emergency room.




Handbook of Clinical Diagnostics


Book Description

The book covers basic theories, basic knowledge and basic skills on clinical diagnosis, basic requirements for doctors’ ethical conduct, clinical reasoning and documentation of medical records during the process of making a diagnosis. It consists of six parts, including ‘Symptoms’, ‘History Taking’, ‘Physical Examination’, ‘Supplementary Examination’, ‘Common Clinical Diagnosis Techniques’, and ‘Diagnostic Process and Clinical Reasoning’. A vocabulary index is included for easy reference at the end of the book. This book is compiled by authors of 14 Chinese medical schools and universities, whose years of experience in clinical diagnostics, rich overseas learning and working experiences. This book is included in the first round of English textbooks series for clinical medicine major of China's higher medical colleges; and is among "13th Five-Year" planning textbooks of National Health Commission of the People’s Republic of China. It is also an ideal textbook for MBBS (Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery) student It is a co-publication book with People's Medical Publishing House (PMPH). The ISBN of PMPH version in China is 978-7-117-23852-6.