Like Vampires Drinking Holy Water – Part 1
One of the most fearsome and unpredictable events we may face as surgeons in the Emergency Room... Patients coming in after caustic ingestion enclose a vast spectrum of injuries: from none to complete necrosis of the upper gastrointestinal tract... Making a correct diagnosis and defining a precise grading is essential to plan the best following management...
Escaping Oceanic Flight 815
Sometimes, during a cholecystectomy performed for acute cholecystitis, you may find yourself stuck in a difficult situation... Adhesions and fibrosis may prevent a safe dissection, and obtaining an adequate Critical View of Safety is quite impossible. In these cases, the bail-out procedures might be useful to avoid intra- and postoperative complications...
The Spice That Makes Things Hot
Sometimes the open abdomen and appropriate resuscitation are not enough to make patients recover from their pathological state... In these rare but threatening events, direct peritoneal resuscitation comes handy to help and fasten patients' healing.
Pricking the Big Red Balloon
Intra-abdominal hypertension is a critical state that may lead to multiorgan failure and, eventually, to death. However, the diagnosis of this condition is often missed, and the intra-abdominal pressure is a parameter frequently forgotten...
When Dwarves’ Doctors are not Small Doctors
Children are not small adults... and this concept is true in many ways... Dealing with them cannot be done as in adults, and the surgical emergencies that may uprise are completely different from the ones general surgeons are used to... Here you can find a brief yet comprehensive guide on how to deal with a child with a suspected acute abdomen...
