Department Blog

Ben Lawner, DO, EMT-P, and Tom Chiccone, MD, were faculty members for the 8th Annual Eastern Shore Emergency and Critical Care Symposium, held in Easton on October 3. Dr. Lawner’s topic was prehospital trauma resuscitation, and Dr. Chiccone, from Memorial Hospital at Easton, spoke on blast injuries. The event was sponsored by University of Maryland ExpressCare.

Amal Mattu, MD, was the keynote speaker (and the only speaker from the United States) at the "Emergency Medicine Update‒Europe" conference, held in Haro, Spain, in late September. He presented three lectures: “Syncope Made Simple,” “Dysrhythmias in the ED,” and “Emergency Care of the Elder Patient.”

In a case report published in the September issue of the Journal of Medical Toxicology, Dr. Fermin Barrueto, Jr., and colleagues from George Washington University and the Center for Occupational and Environemental Neurology, describe a patient's exposure to mercury when a bougie broke during a Roux-en-Y gastric bypass procedure. The article concludes with a call for hospitals to stop using mercury-weighted instruments because of the risks they pose to patients and staff.

Brad Cotter, MD, recently published two articles on the use of caffeinated energy drinks by young adults who come to emergency departments. One article was in the August issue of Clinical Toxicology and the other in the October issue of Pediatric Emergency Care.

Y. Veronica Pei, MD, MPH, MEd, published a case report titled “Intrahepatic Hematoma Requiring Hepatic Artery Embolization: A Rare Complication of Extracorporeal Shock Wave Lithotripsy” in the September issue of the American Journal of Emergency Medicine.

Amal Mattu, MD, was the keynote speaker at "Urgencia UC: Conceptos 2013," the annual emergency medicine conference sponsored by the Catholic University of Chile. He conducted a 5-hour ECG conference and presented three lectures: “10 Things You Must Consider in the Decompensating Patient: Beyond A-B-C and ACLS,” “Infections in the Elderly: Simple Pearls to Save a Life,” and “Syncope, Sudden Death, and the ECG.”

Ken Butler, DO, was a faculty member for this year’s Scientific Assembly of the American College of Osteopathic Emergency Physicians. He presented lectures on traumatic brain injury and conscious sedation. The conference was held in San Diego in early October.

Congratulations to Drs. Witting, Sommerkamp, Euerle and alumnus Milan Vora on their article titled "No effect of valsalva maneuver or trendelenburg angle on axillary vein size" that was recently published in the Journal of Emergency Medicine. You can find the abstract here http://www.jem-journal.com/article/S0736-4679%2812%2901726-X/abstract

A huge thank you to all the University of Maryland physicians, nurses, residents, and nurse practiionars that are working at the Grand Prix or Baltimore this weekend providing medical coverage to the drivers and spectators. A huge thank you to Dr. Benjamin Lawner for coordinating the medical support.

More information on the Grand Prix of Baltimore can be found at http://www.grandprixofbaltimore.com/

Ben Lawner, DO, EMT-P, presented a general session lecture titled "Avoiding Common Prehospital Errors; Don't Bury Your Mistakes" at ClinCon, a continuing education conference for prehospital care providers, nurses, and physicians. The conference, with more than 300 attendees, was held in Orlando in mid-July. Following the lecture, Dr. Lawner led a breakout session on the recognition and management of post cardiac arrest syndrome.