EM Fundamentals

APPROACH TO CHEST PAIN

Goals and Objectives Goals Resident will be comfortable with initial evaluation and basic management of patients with chest pain Learning Objectives Resident will be able to list six immediately life-threatening causes of chest pain Resident will be able to describe the typical presentation and alarm symptoms for life-threatening causes of chest pain Resident will be able to list appropriate diagnostic tests and treatments for life-threatening causes of chest pain

Recommended Resources Prior to Conference Chest Pain Pocket Card (EM Basic) Chest Pain ECG Case (Amal Mattu) Additional Resources Acute Coronary Syndromes See Topic: Acute Coronary Syndromes PV Card: TIMI Risk Score (ALIEM) SMART EM Stress Test Summary (EMCrit) Who Needs PCI? (EMCrit / Steve Smith's ECG Blog) (pdf) Pulmonary Embolism Acute Pulmonary Embolism (NEJM 2010) PE Treatment Options (EMCrit) When the PERC Rule Fails (ALIEM) PV Card: D-dimer (ALIEM) Aortic Dissection Aortic Dissection Review (CoreEM) Aortic Dissection (EMCrit 2013) Does this patient have an acute thoracic aortic dissection? (JAMA) Acute Nontraumatic Thoracic Aortic Dissection (ACEP Clinical Policy) Pneumothorax Management of Spontaneous Pneumothorax: ACCP Consensus (Chest 2001) (pdf) Pneumothorax: an update (Postgrad Med J 2007) (pdf) Tension Pneumothorax (trauma.org) Needle Decompression for Tension Pneumothorax (EPMonthly) Cardiac Tamponade Acute Cardiac Tamponade (NEJM 2003) Cardiac Tamponade Revisited (Tex Health Inst 2007) Pericardiocentesis (Ultrasound Podcast) Pericardiocentesis (NEJM) Esophageal Perforation Management of Esophageal Perforation (Gastro Res 2010) Esophageal Perforation (Rosen's) Esophageal Ruptures and Tears (Medscape)

Original Post by Eric Shappell on 9/11/2014
Reviewed by James Ahn on 9/11/2014
Last Updated by Eric Shappell on 06/09/2016 Contact / Feedback