Petechiae

3peas · Jun 19, 2017

It's not a normal finding. But I wouldn't worry about this too much. Don't get stuck in the trees. You'll never master all concepts.

Lev, MSN, RN, NP · Jun 20, 2017

Probably in a patient with chronic cardiac issues who has had them for years.

michellelreck · Jun 21, 2017

I've had patients with petechiae because of when they were pushing during labor.

bgxyrnf, MSN, RN · Jun 25, 2017

It's never a normal finding but neither is it necessarily an ominous finding.

From an ED perspective, I wouldn't be terribly worried about a few petechiae in the absence of signs of bacteremia or thrombocytopenia.

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I agree with 3peas, though: Don't get hung up on details; focus on broad, overarching principles.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Jun 30, 2017

When I was in nursing school, I studied the chapter on petechia. At the time, I wore clogs everywhere I went -- they were the only paid or shoes I owned. I used to stand on one foot and rub my leg with my other foot . . . Turns out that just about everything in the world makes me itch. One morning, I woke up with -- you guessed it -- petechiae. They were all up and down my legs (where I'd been rubbing with my wooden clogs). I was sure I had leukemia and was going to die . . . I took myself off to the student health center where I listed my major complaint.

When the doctor saw me, he wasn't impressed with my petechiae. He asked me how I even knew the word. And then, he said "AH. You're a nursing student." And told me that I'd been studying too hard. And that next week, when my class discussed solid tumors, he'd have a few nursing students visiting him, convinced they had cancer and were going to die.

Evidently he was right, because it's been forty some years and I'm still alive.