For the past 20-odd years in the United States, traumatic and acute conditions have often been treated in the Emergency Room using opioid drugs. Now, with the effects of a nationwide opioid addiction crisis becoming increasingly dire, hospitals and trauma centers are looking for new ways to treat pain without prescribing addictive opioid painkillers.
Uncertainty – especially in economics, government, or healthcare - can be hard to handle. Combine a little bit of uncertainty in Washington D.C. and the medical community and you’ll have a window into 2017, a time when the future of the Affordable Health Care Act and the health sector is in flux.
Osgood-Schlatter disease is a developmental disorder that causes musculoskeletal problems and is rare in the normal population. However, the condition is more common in teenagers who play sports, affecting an estimated 3-5% percent of this population; it causes painful inflammation below the knee in adolescents and can lead to permanent soft tissue damage.
Increasingly, anesthesiologists have been using ultrasound guidance to help visualize soft tissue anatomy and nerve location while performing regional nerve blocks. Correct placement of local anesthetics lead to long lasting pain management and enhanced recovery times.
But beyond the block, how does ultrasound help anesthesiologists do their jobs?
The answer has a lot to do with the changing practice of medicine.
In the world of emergency medicine, there’s nothing fun about the guessing game. With a seriously ill or injured patient, every second counts and the wrong diagnosis can actually have a significant impact on health. That’s why having all available information is absolutely critical to stabilizing patients and saving lives.
That’s also what makes point-of-care ultrasound so critically important in emergency care.
Veterinary patients can be such pigs. At the Pittsburgh Zoo, they are occasionally lethargic, critically endangered warty pigs.
In her View from the Hill article, Jill Rathbun of the Galileo Consulting Group summarizes the recent annual Medicare Payment Advisory Committee (MedPac) report and explains how implementing a point of care ultrasound program can align health care delivery with the goals and themes of the report.
by Nidhi Nikhanj, MD
In this article for Health Management Magazine, Dr. Nidhi Nikhanj lays out the path for a system-wide implementation of point-of-care ultrasound to bring quality of care and enhanced patient safety to the bedside. What 6 steps should a large health system use to successfully implement point-of-care ultrasound?
Read the full article from Health Management Magazine to find out!
Dr. Byron Patterson, is a partner in Primary Care Sports Medicine in Tarzana California, recently visted Sonosite headquarters and gave a presentation to Sonosite employees about ultrasound applications in sports medicine.