My emergency medicine rotation consisted of being in an emergency room doing 12-hour shifts three days a week for five weeks. Some of the shifts were during the day (7a-7p) and others were overnight (1p-1a), and most weeks I worked on a weekend day. I really enjoyed my five weeks working in the emergency room. I saw many different patients with a myriad of different pathologies and ailments. I saw close to a dozen patients every day. The emergency room consisted of two separate triaging areas. One of the areas called Fast Track consisted of lower acuity patients with muscle …

For my site evaluations, I did three History and Physicals on several different patients. The first patient I wrote about had facial drooping for a couple of days. The first must-not miss diagnosis you must have on your differentials must be CVA, but this patient did not present with any of those signs or symptoms. The second patient had an acute abdomen with abdominal pain, emesis, and diarrhea for four days. The differential list of those are pages long, but with a good history/PE and imaging, we found that she had colitis. The third patient was a young woman who …

Hematuria: Is it useful in predicting renal or ureteral stones in patient presenting to emergency department with flank pain? As I have spent several weeks at the emergency room, I have noticed many patients who came in with kidney stones, and one of the main imaging modalities that were used was a non-contrast CT scan. I wanted to look closer to see if any updates were available in new imaging modalities or other lab tests that could be done to find out if someone has a kidney stone without subjecting them to radiation. I found a study that aimed to …

Chief complaint: Facial droop X 2 days HPI: 62 y/o female with PMHx of GERD, HTN, HLD, migraines and a CVA 15 years ago presents to the emergency room today with complaints of left facial weakness and decreased taste in her mouth since yesterday morning, which has then worsened today. She mentions she could not come to the ER yesterday because she was working. Pt. denies headache, shortness of breath, fever, chills, chest pain, dysuria, cough, nausea, dizziness, numbness, tingling, diarrhea, constipation, or vomiting. Past Medical History GERD HTN Hyperlipidemia Migraines without an aura Stroke (circa 2009) Past surgical history …