HINTS IN THE ER- case report

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Zasadzińska ◽  
Andrzej Kukwa

Vertigo is a false sense of motion of either the environment or self and is diagnosed in approximately half of the patients with dizziness. Acute spontaneous onset of vertigo is called acute vestibular neuritis (AVN). It is caused by peripheral lesion and requires symptomatic treatment. The symptoms of AVN can mimic a central pathology like cerebellar or brainstem infarction with no concomitant red-flag manifestation. Magnetic Resonance Neuroimaging with Diffusion-weighted imaging (MRI-DWI) as well as Computed Tomography (CT) scan delivers false negatives results what significantly delays stroke treatment. HINTS is an acronym for the battery of three bedside tests of ocular motor physiology. The method is more sensitive in diagnosing posterior circulation infarct than MRI-DWI with specificity -96 %. We present a case of a patient with vertigo who underwent two cranial CT scans and neurological examination. HINTS was worrisome. The brainstem infarct diagnosis was confirmed by MRI-DWI.

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 2514183X1988615
Author(s):  
Alexander A Tarnutzer ◽  
Marianne Dieterich

In the initial assessment of the patient with acute vertigo or dizziness, both structured history-taking and a targeted bedside neuro-otological examination are essential for distinguishing potentially life-threatening central vestibular causes from those of benign, self-limited peripheral labyrinthine origin and thus for deciding on further diagnostic testing. In this article, the key elements of the vestibular and ocular motor examination, which should be obtained at the bedside in these acutely dizzy patients, will be discussed. Specifically, this will include the following five domains: ocular stability for (I) nystagmus and for (II) eye position (skew deviation), (III) the head-impulse test (HIT), (IV) postural stability, and (V) ocular motor deficits of saccades, smooth pursuit eye movements, and optokinetic nystagmus. We will also discuss the diagnostic accuracy of specific combinations of these bedside tests (i.e. HIT, testing for nystagmus and vertical divergence, referred to as the H.I.N.T.S. three-step examination), emphasizing that the targeted neuro-otological bedside examination is more sensitive for identifying central causes in acute prolonged vertigo and dizziness than early MRI of the brain.


Neurology ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 70 (17) ◽  
pp. e57-e67 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. C. Frohman ◽  
S. Galetta ◽  
R. Fox ◽  
D. Solomon ◽  
D. Straumann ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
David S. Zee

Abstract:This paper is directed primarily to clinicians who diagnose and treat patients with neurological disorders. It is an attempt to illustrate that even with modern imaging technology and other advances in laboratory testing, a thorough understanding of neurophysiology and its anatomical substrate still plays an important role in the diagnosis and management of patients with neurological diseases. One area in neurophysiology in which there has been great progress in the last few decades is the ocular motor system. Particular interest has been focused on the ways that the brain can adapt to lesions, and more specifically, how the ocular motor system keeps itself calibrated in the face of normal development and aging as well as in response to disease and trauma. Since disorders of eye movements are such common and often dramatic manifestations of neurological disease it seems appropriate to bring some of the newer concepts in ocular motor physiology to the “bedside”.


Author(s):  
Hong Chuan Loh ◽  
Kah Hay Yuen ◽  
Irene Looi

A female patient in her 40’s of mixed Chinese-Indian ancestry was referred to our neurology clinic for frequent migraine with aura and CADASIL. She had been treated for acute encephalopathy in 2014. The incident led to her CADASIL diagnosis and later retinitis pigmentosa, both rare conditions. Initial clinical assessment showed moderate severity of migraine and normal cognitive function. As there is no specific treatment recommended for CADASIL, the patient was maintained on pharmacological therapies for secondary prevention of ischaemic stroke, treatment of seizure, symptomatic treatment for migraine and a cholesterol-lowering drug. A supplement containing Vitamin E (tocotrienols) was recommended. During the ensuing 5-years, there were no further neurovascular incidents and her migraine went into full remission.


2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 1944-1955 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Schwarz ◽  
Elizabeth C. Ward ◽  
Petrea Cornwell ◽  
Anne Coccetti ◽  
Pamela D'Netto ◽  
...  

Purpose The purpose of this study was to examine (a) the agreement between allied health assistants (AHAs) and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) when completing dysphagia screening for low-risk referrals and at-risk patients under a delegation model and (b) the operational impact of this delegation model. Method All AHAs worked in the adult acute inpatient settings across three hospitals and completed training and competency evaluation prior to conducting independent screening. Screening (pass/fail) was based on results from pre-screening exclusionary questions in combination with a water swallow test and the Eating Assessment Tool. To examine the agreement of AHAs' decision making with SLPs, AHAs ( n = 7) and SLPs ( n = 8) conducted an independent, simultaneous dysphagia screening on 51 adult inpatients classified as low-risk/at-risk referrals. To examine operational impact, AHAs independently completed screening on 48 low-risk/at-risk patients, with subsequent clinical swallow evaluation conducted by an SLP with patients who failed screening. Results Exact agreement between AHAs and SLPs on overall pass/fail screening criteria for the first 51 patients was 100%. Exact agreement for the two tools was 100% for the Eating Assessment Tool and 96% for the water swallow test. In the operational impact phase ( n = 48), 58% of patients failed AHA screening, with only 10% false positives on subjective SLP assessment and nil identified false negatives. Conclusion AHAs demonstrated the ability to reliably conduct dysphagia screening on a cohort of low-risk patients, with a low rate of false negatives. Data support high level of agreement and positive operational impact of using trained AHAs to perform dysphagia screening in low-risk patients.


2005 ◽  
Vol 38 (8) ◽  
pp. 55
Author(s):  
MICHELE G. SULLIVAN
Keyword(s):  

2009 ◽  
Vol 2 (11) ◽  
pp. 9
Author(s):  
AMY ROTHMAN SCHONFELD

Methodology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 97-105
Author(s):  
Rodrigo Ferrer ◽  
Antonio Pardo

Abstract. In a recent paper, Ferrer and Pardo (2014) tested several distribution-based methods designed to assess when test scores obtained before and after an intervention reflect a statistically reliable change. However, we still do not know how these methods perform from the point of view of false negatives. For this purpose, we have simulated change scenarios (different effect sizes in a pre-post-test design) with distributions of different shapes and with different sample sizes. For each simulated scenario, we generated 1,000 samples. In each sample, we recorded the false-negative rate of the five distribution-based methods with the best performance from the point of view of the false positives. Our results have revealed unacceptable rates of false negatives even with effects of very large size, starting from 31.8% in an optimistic scenario (effect size of 2.0 and a normal distribution) to 99.9% in the worst scenario (effect size of 0.2 and a highly skewed distribution). Therefore, our results suggest that the widely used distribution-based methods must be applied with caution in a clinical context, because they need huge effect sizes to detect a true change. However, we made some considerations regarding the effect size and the cut-off points commonly used which allow us to be more precise in our estimates.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document