EM Fundamentals

APPROACH TO ABDOMINAL PAIN

Goals and Objectives Goals Resident will be comfortable with initial evaluation and basic management of patients with abdominal pain Learning Objectives For patients presenting with abdominal pain, resident will be able to: List and describe classic features of common life- and organ-threatening diagnoses: Aortic Aneurysm Appendicitis Biliary Tract Infections Bowel Obstructions Ectopic Pregnancy Mesenteric Ischemia Pancreatitis Testicular/Ovarian Torsion Name the imaging modality of choice to diagnose each of the above conditions (if applicable)

Recommended Resources Prior to Conference Assessing Abdominal Pain (EBMedicine) Additional Resources Aortic Aneurysm AAA Clinical Highlights (emDocs 2015) AAA (LITFL 2015) AAA Treatment Guidelines (J Vasc Surg 2003) AAA Ultrasound (SonoGuide) CDEM on AAA Appendicitis CDEM on Appendicitis Suspected Appendicitis (NEJM 2003) (pdf) Biliary Tract Infections CDEM on Biliary Tract Disease Bowel Obstructions CDEM on SBO EAST on SBO Management of SBO (Advances in Surgery) Large Bowel Obstruction (Medscape) SBO (Flipped EM Classroom) CDEM on Perforated Viscous Perforated Viscus (Flipped EM Classroom) Ectopic Pregnancy Ectopic Pregnancy (EM:RAP 2008) Ectopic Pregnancy (EM:RAP 2004) Ectopic Pregnancy (NEJM 2009) Ectopic Pregnancy (Flipped EM Classroom) CDEM on Ectopic Pregnancy Mesenteric Ischemia CDEM on Mesenteric Ischemia Pancreatitis Acute Pancreatitis (NEJM 2006) Testicular Torsion CDEM on Testicular Torsion Testicular Torsion (Flipped EM Classroom) Ovarian Torsion CDEM on Ovarian Torsion Ovarian Torsion (Flipped EM Classroom) Textbooks Cope's Early Diagnosis of the Acute Abdomen

Original Post by Eric Shappell on 10/20/2014
Reviewed by James Ahn on 10/20/2014
Last Updated by Eric Shappell on 04/30/2016 Contact / Feedback