EVALUATION OF THE PATIENT WITH SHORTNESS OF BREATH: AN EVIDENCE BASED APPROACH
Section snippets
SCOPE OF THE PROBLEM
Shortness of breath is an uncomfortable subjective symptom for the patient and a challenge for the clinician who must evaluate and diagnose its cause. Dyspnea has more than 30 attributed causes involving single and multiple organ systems.17 The prevalence of dyspnea varies among clinical settings and patient subgroups. Investigators have found the prevalence of shortness of breath to be 3% to 25% in the general community,17 3.7% in general medicine clinics,12 2.7% in emergency departments (EDs),
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Cited by (36)
ACR Appropriateness Criteria <sup>®</sup> Chronic Dyspnea-Noncardiovascular Origin
2018, Journal of the American College of RadiologyCitation Excerpt :The differential diagnosis encompasses a wide variety of pathologies [3], including cardiovascular, pulmonary, gastrointestinal, neuromuscular, systemic, and psychogenic disorders. A multifactorial etiology is reported in up to a third of patients [4], with cardiovascular and pulmonary etiologies being the most common. Chronic dyspnea can be associated with a wide variety of disorders involving the airways, airspace, interstitium, pulmonary vessels, mediastinum and hila, pleura, diaphragm, and chest wall.
Correlates and Predictors of Changes in Dyspnea Symptoms over Time among Community-Dwelling Palliative Home Care Clients
2015, Journal of Pain and Symptom ManagementWhen the chief complaint is (or should be) dyspnea in adults
2013, Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology: In PracticeCitation Excerpt :Many physicians find measures of symptom effect or burden such as the Medical Research Council breathlessness scale17 most useful in practice; however, it must be acknowledged that such scales do not address what breathing feels like, the essence of dyspnea. It has been suggested that two-thirds of the causes of dyspnea are due to either a pulmonary or cardiac disorder18 and that up to 85% of cases are caused by asthma, COPD, interstitial lung disease, pneumonia, cardiac ischemia, congestive heart failure, or psychogenic disorders (eg, anxiety, panic, or posttraumatic stress disorders).19 Therefore, it is not surprising that much of the evaluation of the patient with dyspnea focuses on the cardiopulmonary systems.
Multimarker strategy for short-term risk assessment in patients with dyspnea in the emergency department: The MARKED (Multi mARKer Emergency Dyspnea)-risk score
2012, Journal of the American College of CardiologyShortness of Breath in the Patient with Chronic Liver Disease
2012, Clinics in Liver Disease
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Division of Emergency Medicine, Northwestern University School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois