Common Bedside Emergencies

bedside emergencies from icufaqs.org = godsend

http://www.icufaqs.org/BedsideEmergencies.doc

[quote=Ayvah;3904530]I'm pleased to see this thread start up. I think there is too little focus on what to do when things go wrong in school, so I'm always glad to discuss this.


: Makes too much urine? - are they getting lasix? What makes you think they are peeing too much? I'm hard pressed to think of how this is a problem. Usually if they are peeing a TON, it is because they are getting a diuretic and are excreting a huge backlog of fluid in their legs/feet/lungs that has been making them edematous and coarse, or it is because they are one of those patients with a half gallon jug of water on their table who also has a 175ml/hr IV going.

/quote]


Re: Making too much urine. I took care of a quadraplegic who drank so much she depleted her sodium...I'm talking the woman would put out in excess of 1500ml urine in a 8 hour shift. She eventually required a fluid restriction b/c of this problem. So too much urine, I'd check for hyponatremia or something like diabetes insipidus/siadh.

I'm curious, how much was that woman drinking per day? And how low did her sodium go?

This is great. I have been working on an inpatient surgical unit the last 8 months and still worry that I'll miss something. We have a huge variety of patients (vascular, CT, transplant, bowel) that it makes my head spin to keep up with all of the possible things that could happen over the course of a shift!