Acute conditions in palliative care patients
- Abdominal conditions, acute
- Arrhythmias
- Cardiac failure – decompensated
- Coronary syndrome, acute
- Delirium
- Electrolyte derangement
- Fracture
- Hyperglycaemia
- Hypertension
- Hypoglycaemia
- Hypotension
- Increased intracranial pressure (ICP)
- Injury post-fall
- Liver failure – decompensated
- Perforated viscus
- Pericardial effusion
- Pleural effusion
- Renal failure, acute
- Respiratory failure
- Sepsis
- Stroke
- Substance:
- Thromboembolic disease
- Urinary retention
Palliative care emergencies
- Airway obstruction
- Haemorrhage
- Opioid toxicity
- Seizures
- Severe agitation
- Severe pain, acute
- Spinal cord compression
- Superior vena cava obstruction
For each presentation and condition, Advanced Trainees will know how to:
Synthesise
- recognise the clinical presentation
- identify relevant epidemiology, prevalence, pathophysiology, and clinical science
- take a comprehensive clinical history
- conduct an appropriate examination
- establish a differential diagnosis
- plan and arrange appropriate investigations
- consider the impact of illness and disease on patients and their quality of life when developing a management plan
Manage
- provide evidence-based management
- prescribe therapies tailored to patients’ needs and conditions
- recognise potential complications of disease and its management, and initiate preventative strategies
- involve multidisciplinary teams
Consider other factors
- identify individual and social factors and the impact of these on diagnosis and management
Investigations
- Blood tests
- ECG
- Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP)
- Imaging, such as:
- bone scan
- CT
- echocardiogram
- MRI
- ultrasound
- x-ray
Procedures
- Biliary stent – percutaneous
- Nephrostomy – percutaneous
- Pericardial:
- Pleural tap
- Superior vena cava (SVC) stent
- Surgical fixation of fractures
- Ureteric stent
