An 85-year-old Woman with Altered Mental Status and Hypotension
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Abstract
An 85-year-old female patient was brought to emergency department (ED) from a nursing home with altered mental status (GCS: 12/15) and hypotension (90/60 mmHg). Bilateral fine crackles in lungs and severe cachexia were obvious in her physical examination. The ECG showed only sinus tachycardia. Several attempts at peripheral vein cannulation failed due to poor visualization of severely atrophied and contracted subcutaneous veins. Therefore, on two attempts, a central venous catheter (CVC) was inserted into the right internal jugular vein (IJV) using the Seldinger technique. After securing and taping the central line, fluid infusion started with no difficulty and a portable chest x-ray was ordered.
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2. Roldan CJ, Paniagua L. Central Venous Catheter Intravascular Malpositioning: Causes, Prevention, Diagnosis, and Correction. West J Emerg Med. 2015;16(5):658–664.
3. Horowitz R, Gossett JG, Bailitz J, et al. The FLUSH study--flush the line and ultrasound the heart: ultrasonographic confirmation of central femoral venous line placement. Ann Emerg Med. 2014;63(6):678-83.
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| Files | ||
| Issue | Vol 3 No 3 (2019): Summer (July) | |
| Section | Imaging based learning points | |
| PMCID | PMC6683595 | |
| PMID | 31410409 | |
| Keywords | ||
| Altered Mental Status | ||
| Rights and permissions | |
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. |
How to Cite
1.
Sotoodehnia M, Abdollahi A, Khodayar M. An 85-year-old Woman with Altered Mental Status and Hypotension. Front Emerg Med. 2019;3(3):e32.
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