EMS Fellow University of New Mexico Department of Emergency Medicine Albuquerque, New Mexico
Disclosure(s):
Christopher W. Root, MD: Stryker Physio-Control: Other Financial or Material Support (Ongoing)
You're half way between the sending hospital and the tertiary center and your submassive PE patient starts crashing in front of you. What do you do next?
Pulmonary embolism is a deadly disease process with a wide variety of presentations and potential interventions. As PE care advances and regional referrals for treatment become more common, CCT providers will encounter PE patients more and more frequently. Despite this the foundational education in this disease process for EMS providers is desperately lacking. In this session we will review the basic pathophysiology of PE, discuss standard treatments and the management of the Right ventricular failure as well as review novel PE therapeutics being utilized at tertiary referral centers with increasing frequency.
Learning Objectives:
Differentiate low, intermediate and high risk PE patients to appropriately triage their response and anticipate need for intervention in transport.
Understand the underlying physiology of RV failure and tailor appropriate pharmacotherapy to optimize the hemodynamics of these critically patients.
Explain the basic differences between novel advanced therapeutics for PE patients including percutaneous thrombectomy, catheter directed lysis and ECMO