Lesson From The Street: Skin Doesn ’t Lie

I hope you’re sitting down for this. I trust that a good number of my readers do indeed sit while surfing the internet so I’m just going to tell you this strait up. Sometimes … patients lie. They do.  Occasionally they intentionally tell us bold, outright lies. And it gets worse. With even greater frequency they are just plain inaccurate. They may not be intentionally deceiving us, they may be confused, misinformed, exaggerating, in denial, overwhelmed or embarrassed. Regardless of the reason, we are frequently faced with subjective information that isn’t all together accurate. Contents What’s an EMT to do?Pay attention to your patient’s skinColorTemperatureMoistureWhat’s an EMT to do? I don’t want to suggest that you should skip or disregard your subjective assessment. The things that your patient tells you are vital and important clinical findings. Even inaccurate information can give you vital clues regarding the patient’s mental status and physical condition. But I’d also suggest that you put a premium on physical findings that give you instant and accurate information about the patient’s physical condition. The longer I work in emergency service the more I find myself falling back on basic patient assessment truths like this one: Pay attention to your patient’s skin Skin never lies. It tells you a wealth of information about the patients current state of oxygenation and circulatory functio...
Source: The EMT Spot - Category: Emergency Medicine Authors: Tags: EMT Source Type: blogs