Purpose:
Increased intracranial pressure (ICP) is one of the prevalent symptoms of trauma, especially traumatic headache, which requires quick action for the diagnosis and treatment. The optic nerve sheath diameter (ONSD) is a newly proposed technique for the detection of an increase in ICP. The aim of this study was to assess the efficacy of this new diagnostic method in patients with increased ICP induced by trauma.
Methods:
This prospective study was conducted between December 2016 and February 2017. The patients with traumatic headache and who had been diagnosed with increased ICP using clinical signs and computed tomography scan were compared to the voluntary healthy group. In each patient, measurements were performed employing ultrasound three times on each eye in an axial region, and the mean of these sizes was obtained as the ONSD.
Results:
A total of 112 participants were examined. The mean ONSD measurement of the patients and the voluntary healthy group was 6.01 ± 0.76 and 3.41 ± 0.56 mm in the right eye, 6.11 ± 0.75 and 3.39 ± 0.54 mm in the left eye, and 6.06 ± 0.75 and 4.02 ± 1.07 mm in both sides, respectively. The ONSD in the right and left sides had high and significant correlation in the patients (
r
= 0.929,
P
< 0.000) and voluntary healthy (
r
= 0.630,
P
< 0.000) group. The mean ONSD of one of the patients was 6.24 ± 0.56 mm, and in another patient with no clinical sign of increased ICP, the mean ONSD was 4.61 ± 0.09 mm.
Conclusions:
Ultrasound performed on the diaphragm of the optic nerve with acceptable sensitivity can detect patients with an increase in ICP and can be efficacious in expediting the action needed to reduce ICP. Due to the sensitivity and specificity of the ultrasound and high accuracy of the diameter of optic nerve sheath in detecting increase in ICP, as well as considering the fact that ultrasound is a noninvasive and available technique; it can be performed at the patient's bedside.
Hymenoptera stings are self-limiting events or due to allergic reactions. Sometimes envenomation with Hymenoptera can cause rare complications such as acute encephalopathy, peripheral neuritis, acute renal failure, nephrotic syndrome, silent myocardial infarction, rhabdomyolysis, conjunctivitis, corneal infiltration, lens subluxation, and optic neuropathy. The mechanism of peripheral nervous system damage is not clearly known. In our studied case after bee sting on face between the eyebrows with little erythema and 1 × 1 cm in size, bilateral blindness developed and gradually improved. Lateral movement of eyes was restricted with no pain. Involvement of cranial nerves including II, V, and VI was found. With conservative therapy after a year significant improvement has been achieved.
Background: Analgesics such as opioids are commonly used for pain control in emergency departments. correlated respiratory side effects and central nervous system depression confine opioids application as analgesic medication. New pain control choices such as Nitric oxide and Ketamine may be alternatives. This study evaluates efficacy of Nitric Oxide versus Ketamine in purpose of pain reduction in limbs fractures. Methods: In a randomized clinical study, 75 patients that were referred to the emergency department with pain, which has been caused by bone fractures, were randomly assigned into 2 groups: receiving ketamine with an intravenous bolus dose of 0.3 mg/kg versus mixture of 50% nitrous oxide/50% Oxygen. The pain score in the groups were measured and compared by the Visual Analog Scale consecutively at arrival and 5, 10, 15 minutes after intervention. Results: Fifteen minutes after the intervention, the score of pain in patients receiving ketamine, reached 2.5 from 8.86 at the baseline. This is while in the second group, 15 minutes after the treatment, reached to 5.02 from 9.52 at the baseline. The amount of pain reduction in both groups was statistically significant. A point-by-point comparison of the amount of the pain did not show significant differences in both groups. Conclusions: The findings of this study showed that both ketamine and Nitrous Oxide/Oxygen mixture are effective in alleviating the pain of patients with limb's fracture, however, there is no precedence between these medications as a pain killer.
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