Journal of Urgent Care Medicine

Framework For Musculoskeletal Injuries Helps Avoid Missed Diagnosis

A structured approach to evaluating acute musculoskeletal injuries may help reduce missed diagnoses and unnecessary imaging, according to a review article published in Cureus. Musculoskeletal complaints account for an estimated 20%–25% of emergency department visits, and the authors explain that combining injury mechanism, functional assessment, focused physical examination, and targeted imaging can help identify significant injuries. Validated clinical decision tools can safely reduce unnecessary radiographs while still achieving accurate diagnosis, they say. For example, the …

Physicians May Not Recall OAR Clinical Criteria For Ankle Injuries

A cross-sectional survey of 74 urgent care and emergency physicians working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, found adherence to evidence-based ankle sprain guidelines was inconsistent despite high reported awareness of the guidelines, as published in Cureus. While 95.9% of physicians were familiar with the Ottawa Ankle Rules (OAR) that predict the need for radiographs for ankle injuries—and 70.3% reported using them—only 36.5% applied them consistently. Additionally, researchers found just 56.8% of physicians correctly identified the key …

Abstracts in Urgent Care – December 2022

Ivan Koay MBChB, MRCS, FRNZCUC, MD Applying the Ottawa Ankle Rule to Pediatric Patients Take-home point: Application of the Ottawa Ankle Rule (OAR) limits unnecessary imaging in children without missing clinically relevant fractures. Citation: de Almeida S, Rios J, Lima S, et al. Applying the Ottawa Ankle Rule in a pediatric emergency department. Pediatr Emerg Care. 2022;38(3):e1123-e1126. Relevance: Ankles fractures in children are common.Use of the OAR, a simple clinical decision rule, by UC providers …

Login to JUCM