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Severe Sudden Pain

The purposes of this flow chart on the sudden onset of severe posttraumatic pain is to remind you that not all severe pathologies are investigated appropriately by referrers, that in most areas you are able to see patients straight from the accident scene without a physician referral and that it is better to be safe than regret lack of action for the rest of your professional life. It is not a set formulation on how to handle patients nor to relieve you of the effort of using your intellectual gifts in clinical reasoning. Also remember that in all things context is king, that is why in many of the terminal boxes the action is “make a decision” You have a wealth of information that you obtained from the patient; the mechanics of the accident, the exact location of the pain, how this pain is associated with other pain and symptoms, the patient profile and a host of other data; use it.

I hope this is of some use to you, I find that drawing flow charts helps me crystalize my thought process so with that in mind I would ask a favor of you, that is please let me know which points you disagree with and anything I may have missed. This is a good exercise and I recommend it. This chart is made with lucidchart.com and there is a free plan.

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