Emergency Medicine Journal 2008;25:245
© 2008 BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and the College of Emergency Medicine.
EMQ ANSWERS
EMQ EMQ answers
195
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
ANSWER 1
- True. Sensitivities as follows: 85% for joint pain, 78% for joint swelling, 57% for fever.1
- False. Their sensitivities are poor (75% for both white blood cell count and erythrocyte sedimentation rate)2 and specificities are very poor. Synovial total white blood cell count, percentage polymorphonuclear cells and Gram stain are the most helpful test pending synovial fluid culture.1 3
- False.
- True. In addition to antibiotics, the successful treatment of acute septic arthritis requires the removal of pus. There is no evidence that surgical removal of pus is any better than needle aspiration.3 4
ANSWER 2
- False. Whereas allopurinol should not be commenced during an acute episode of gout, patients who are already on it should continue to take it.
- False. Intra-articular, oral, intramuscular or intravenous corticosteroids can be effective in patients unable to tolerate non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs or in those refractory to other treatments.5 Corticosteroids should not be injected
. . . [Full text of this article]
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
Relevant Article
-
Emergency Medicine Questions (EMQ)
Emerg. Med. J. 2008 25: 195.[Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- Citation Map
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
Topic Collections
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
