Teen dies when blood culture protocol botched

<p>"Address the patient’s chief complaint first. In this case, the other symptoms were only side effects of the main problem.</p> <p>Pay attention to lab work. In this case, the elevated white blood count and the related blood culture results.</p> <p>Keep an open mind, broaden your differential and document your medical decision-making (MDM), especially when sending a patient home with pending blood cultures.</p> <p>Avoid anchoring bias and premature closure based on a patient’s self-diagnosis. This teen’s report of a lifting injury does not comport with his signs and symptoms.</p> <p>Follow your hospital’s procedures on abnormal lab results.</p> <p>Don’t automatically write off 'preliminary' culture results."</p> <p><a href= "https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-a-pilcher-md-facep-63307b4a" target="_blank" rel="noopener follow noreferrer" data-wpel-link= "exclude">Charles A. Pilcher</a> is an emergency physician and editor, <a href="https://madmimi.com/p/5f4487" target="_blank" rel="nofollow external noopener noreferrer" data-wpel-link= "external">Medical Malpractice Insights - Learning from Lawsuits</a>.</p> <p>He shares his story and discusses his KevinMD article, "<a href= "https://www.kevinmd.com/2022/07/teen-dies-when-blood-culture-protocol-botched-what-can-we-learn-from-this-tragedy.html">Teen dies when blood culture protocol botched: What can we learn from this tragedy?</a>"</p> <p><strong>Did you enjoy today’s episode?</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.kevinmdpodcast.com/rate/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rate and review</a> the show so more audiences can find <strong>The Podcast by KevinMD</strong>.</p> <p><a href="https://www.kevinmdpodcast.com/follow/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Subscribe on your favorite podcast app</a> to get notified when a new episode comes out.</p> <p><strong><a href="https://earnc.me/HJEKHI" target="_blank" rel= "noopener">Click here to earn 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 CME</a> for this episode.</strong></p> <p>Also available in <a href= "https://www.kevinmdpodcast.com/p/cme/