Pulmonary Edema?

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  1. This is a discussion on Pulmonary Edema? in Critical Care Nursing ... I am a new grad in the ICU. This may be a silly question but can someone tell me what pulmonary...

    by Oct 10, '09
    I am a new grad in the ICU. This may be a silly question but can someone tell me what pulmonary edema sounds like? When I do my assessment on my patients and I listen to his or her lung sounds many times the bases sound diminshed or I can hear bowel sounds (because they are laying)...does it sound gurgly? loud? Is there anything I can key into?
    I know to look at O2 sats, distress, anxiety, shortness of breath...but what if the patient is not experiencing any of these symptoms or they cannot communicate this to me.
    I would appreciate any feed back, correction, guidance...
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    by lostmap Oct 10, '09 9:03 pm
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  2. 4 Comments so far...

  3. Guide
    Oct 18, '09 by
    Pulmonary edema = fluid in the lungs. You will hear crackles, esp coarse crackles. Often you don't need to (or have time to) listen, because with flash pulmonary edema, you'll see frothing at the mouth fairly immediately.
  4. Oct 19, '09 by
    Thank you soooo much for replying and answering my question. You really shed some light on the subject for me.
  5. Admin
    Oct 19, '09 by
    You will benefit from some of the links in this thread, lostmap:
    Helpful Information for the CCU and other Critical Care Units


    Especially these links:

    http://www.wilkes.med.ucla.edu/intro.html

    http://sprojects.mmi.mcgill.ca/mvs/

    http://www.rale.ca/
  6. Oct 20, '09 by
    These websites are great. Thank you sooooo much for your reply.