ROLE OF FOCUS ECHOCARDIOGRAPHY IN AN EMERGENCY
By Dr. Rozina Badal Munir, Visiting Sonologist, Royal Hospital Sharjah, UAE and Head of Vascular Specialty Center, Rawalpindi, Pakistan
E
chocardiography is the gold standard for the diagnosis of many cardiac and pericardial
abnormalities. Echocardiography provides critical information about cardiac structure and function in real time. Due to timely availability of the expert echocardiographers for the most critical resuscitations, emergency physicians have begun to perform focused bedside echocardiography in their daily clinical practice. Focused echocardiography is
used only to answer defined clinical questions and not to detect all possible cardiac pathology. The key is to keep the examination straightforward by evaluating for gross abnormalities and overall cardiac function. Focused echocardiography is not meant to replace comprehensive echocardiographic examinations; rather, its purpose is to provide clinicians with vital, real-time information when comprehensive echocardiography is unavailable. Without bedside echocardiography
or invasive monitoring, clinicians would be left to manage critically ill patients with only indirect information about cardiac structure and function. Classic physical examination findings and changes in vital signs are often absent and unreliable for making critical diagnoses. An electrocardiogram (ECG) is very helpful in patients with certain cardiovascular problems who have diagnostic findings, but the majority of critically ill patients have nonspecific ECG findings. A chest radiograph may also provide some helpful information, but is just as likely to be nonspecific as well.
American Society of Echocardiography (ASE) and the American College of
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