Right lower quadrant abdominal pain is a common presentation to the Emergency Department. While appendicitis is a frequently diagnosed pathology associated with this complaint, there are multiple, well-documented alternatives that must be considered. The authors present a unique case of a 20 year old active duty male who presented with 3 days of acutely worsening right lower quadrant abdominal pain, right flank pain, and anorexia. Following a detailed work-up, computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) demonstrated a bland thrombus within the inferior vena cava (IVC) secondary to a vascular web. This case highlights the difficulty in astutely diagnosing appendicitis utilizing clinical examination and scoring metrics. While IVC thrombosis is a rare phenomenon, it should be considered in the emergency physician’s differential for right lower quadrant abdominal pain, particularly when additional nonspecific symptoms are present.
or testing. We utilized the chi square test to compare follow-up frequency with an alpha of .05.Results: We enrolled 170 patients over the course of our study. The sample was 48% female with a median age range from 55-64. The rates of compliance with screening for each cancer were: breast -52.7%; cervical -77.7%; colorectal -63.9%; and lung -20%. Approximately 41% of patients surveyed were out of screening compliance and were randomized to control vs intervention. In the control group, 20% of patients reported seeing a doctor to discuss screening vs 50% in the intervention group (p<.001). At the 30-day follow-up, 50% of the intervention group reported receiving the recommended screening.Conclusion: Our patient population demonstrated overall poor adherence to recommended cancer screening guidelines, especially with regard to lung cancer. With minimal education and an informational handout, however, we demonstrated a significant increase in cancer screening follow-up and testing.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.