Author
McArdle, MichaelAffiliation
University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS TrustPublication date
2023-12-07Subject
Diseases & disorders of systemic, metabolic or environmental originElderly care.
Emergency medicine
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Life expectancy has more than doubled in the last century, and a new cohort of elderly and increasingly frail patients is presenting to emergency departments with new clinical challenges. When this patient cohort presents after injury, all aspects of clinical practice have to be recalibrated to provide safe and appropriate care. The prevalence of chronic disease, levels of organ failure, multiple comorbidities, greater use of anticoagulation and incidence of recurrent low- and high-impact trauma may delay and obscure diagnosis and, ultimately, increase mortality.Older age is a risk factor for rectus sheath haematoma (RSH), which is haemorrhage into the potential space surrounding the rectus abdominis muscle/s. It is a rare presentation following trauma but can provide diagnostic challenges and be fatal. Even more rare is bilateral RSH with only 12 reported in the literature since 1981.This case report describes bilateral RSH presenting in an elderly woman following a fall and the consequences of seemingly minor trauma in the elderly.Citation
BMJ Case Rep . 2023 Dec 7;16(12):e256061Type
ArticleOther
PMID
38061846Journal
BMJ Case ReportsPublisher
BMJae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1136/bcr-2023-256061