Pediatric emergency care
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Acute pancreatitis in childhood is not a rare condition, and it should be considered in all children presenting with acute abdominal complaints. A complete history should be obtained, with emphasis on recent trauma or infection, current medications, and the presence of any chronic diseases. ⋯ Appropriate aggressive treatment, instituted early, will help to reduce the associated morbidity and mortality. Most children with acute pancreatitis will recover with conservative management and suffer no significant long-term sequelae.
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Pediatric emergency care · Jun 1992
Measurement of severity for nonhospitalized injuries in the pediatric age group.
To better classify minor injuries in the pediatric outpatient population, we empirically developed a scale to predict functional impairment, one week and one month postinjury, based on data available at the time of care. A sample of 857 injured children aged five to 19 years was randomly split into two subsamples. Using logistic regression techniques, predictive models were developed and confirmed on the subsamples and then applied to the full sample. ⋯ Type of injury, specifically fracture, dislocation, and sprain, and location of injury (lower extremity) were significant predictors of functional impairment one month postinjury; however, once again, the type of injury was the only variable consistently significant across all models. Other than the type of injury, the variables available at the time of care were too uniform between disabled and nondisabled patients to be useful in developing a severity scale for minor injuries. We conclude that other outcome measurements or scale development techniques should be explored to develop a useful classification scheme for minor injuries.
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Pediatric emergency care · Jun 1992
Metal detectors: an alternative approach to the evaluation of coin ingestions in children?
Foreign body ingestions constitute a common problem in pediatric emergency medicine. Recent data indicate that, despite current recommendations, most children who ingest coins do not undergo radiologic evaluation. The purpose of this study was to determine the accuracy of a metal detector in locating coins in a model simulating coin ingestions in children. ⋯ The study was conducted in a blinded manner and consisted of 50 attempts equally divided among pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and controls (no coin). The accuracy of the metal detector in identifying the presence or absence of coins in our model was 100%. We conclude that the metal detector evaluated by us is highly accurate in identifying coins through human tissues and that it should become a valuable and practical tool in the evaluation of children following a coin ingestion.