Month: February 2020

• There are some great cerebral palsy resources out there:
• The Cerebral Palsy Alliance has a nice infographic overview of CP.
• For more detailed clinical information, have a look at the Australasian Academy of Cerebral Palsy and Developmental Medicine web resources, which has a great collection of information for generalists, as well as specialised documents for the 6% of CP patients who have dyskinesia
• Considering pain affects 75% of people with cerebral palsy, it is a vital consideration in any acute change or hospital presentation.

Wed 19 Feb 2020

• Acute Rheumatic Fever can present as isolated chest pain & cardiac features, and no fever, no joint symptoms.
• It can be worth getting a second opinion regarding imaging investigations when there is a clinical suspicion of a high morbidity diagnosis.
• There is a high incidence of ARFv in the Kimberly currently, anecdotally, although WA historically compares similarly to other Australian states.
• Remember the 2012 Australian Acute Rheumatic Fever Guidelines, which are available as an app both on iOS, and Android.

• Thoracic neuroblastoma or lymphoma can present as a pneumonia – the symptoms of fever, malaise are from chemokines produced by the neuroblastoma or the lymphoma, and may or may not be accompanied by respiratory infection.
• RBC rouleaux effect means the RCC will be lower and not be accurate, the MCV may be increased
• “Osmosis” is a Youtube channel which posts short videos which can be useful for learning and revision by video
• If you have a clinical instinct something is not quite right, then consult your peers. This form of “problem wary” bias (like: “What if it’s lymphoma?”) is good for the patient, whereas the counter bias (like: “it’s probably just pneumonia”) is not so good for patients (Elstad 2010). The way we translate that in patient/family education is a different skill.
• For coding benefits, document diagnostic & treatment associations by writing “…due to…” statements in the medical record…

Wed 5 Feb 2020