By Michael Prats on 02/01/21 04:00 AM
Look - we're sorry. We know you are sick of COVID-19, but when this came across our desk we knew it was important. So far we know that point-of-care lung ultrasound is accurate for the diagnosis and even that extent of sonographic findings can correlate with the severity of disease. Now we ask - could it provide a superior diagnostic strategy to even our beloved PCR?? https://www.ultrasoundgel.org/105 https://www.annemergmed.com/article/S0196-0644(20)31269-5/fulltext
By Michael Prats on 09/14/20 04:00 AM
We haven't discussed COVID-19 for a long time, despite the explosion of POCUS articles on how ultrasound can be used during this pandemic. Many of the articles have focused on the accuracy of POCUS for making the diagnosis, or comparing the ultrasound findings to those on CT. These are helpful, but now what we really want are studies that help establish that POCUS is helping with delivering patient care - either diagnostically or prognostically. This article seems to take the first step in this direction by examining the prognostic utility of lung ultrasound in this disease. https://www.ultrasoundgel.org/98 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32728966/
By Michael Prats on 08/31/20 05:00 AM
We are making some headway in the evidence behind using point-of-care ultrasound in aortic emergencies. This study takes a look at sensitivity and specificity for acute aortic dissection (which has been a few times before) and also compares POCUS to a control group to see if it causes delays or improves times to diagnosis or treatment (has not been done prospectively before). They even look at mortality! https://www.ultrasoundgel.org/97 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31971274/