Introduction: While the typical treatment for trigeminal neuralgia is carbamazepine, the dose must be gradually titrated over time to achieve pain control, which makes the drug a less than ideal candidate for treatment for acute exacerbation of pain due to trigeminal neuralgia in the emergency department (ED) setting. The literature for other effective treatments for acute exacerbations of trigeminal neuralgia is currently lacking. We discuss a case where intravenous (IV) fosphenytoin was used for treatment of acute pain due to trigeminal neuralgia in the ED. 

Case Report: This is a case of a 35-year-old male diagnosed with trigeminal neuralgia who presented with acute facial pain. His history and physical exam were consistent with an acute exacerbation of his trigeminal neuralgia. The patient was refractory to multiple doses of standard pain medication in the ED, and the decision was made to attempt IV fosphenytoin to relieve his pain. He was given 250 milligrams of fosphenytoin that was infused via IV over 10 minutes. By the end of the infusion, the patient had reported complete resolution of his pain.

Conclusion: Fosphenytoin is a viable treatment option for pain relief in patients with acute exacerbation of trigeminal neuralgia. It may be a more favorable drug to use in the ED for acute pain given that carbamazepine must be titrated to effect. It is also possible that lower doses of fosphenytoin may provide equally beneficial analgesic effect than what is described in the literature, as pain relief was achieved in our case with approximately 3 milligrams/kilogram of fosphenytoin.

Introduction: The peripheral internal jugular (IJ), also called the “easy IJ,” is an alternative to peripheral venous access reserved for patients with difficult intravenous (IV) access. The procedure involves placing a single-lumen catheter in the IJ vein under ultrasound (US) guidance. As this technique is relatively new, the details regarding the ease of the procedure, how exactly it should be performed, and the safety of the procedure are uncertain. Our primary objective was to determine the success rate for peripheral IJ placement. Secondarily, we evaluated the time needed to complete the procedure and assessed for complications.

Methods: This was a prospective, single-center study of US-guided peripheral IJ placement using a 2.5-inch, 18-gauge catheter on a convenience sample of patients with at least two unsuccessful attempts at peripheral IV placement by nursing staff. Peripheral IJ lines were placed by emergency medicine (EM) attending physicians and EM residents who had completed at least five IJ central lines. All physicians who placed lines for the study watched a 15-minute lecture about peripheral IJ technique. A research assistant monitored each line to assess for complications until the patient was discharged.

Results: We successfully placed a peripheral IJ in 34 of 35 enrolled patients (97.1%). The median number of attempts required for successful cannulation was one (interquartile range (IQR): 1 to 2). The median time to successful line placement was 3 minutes and 6 seconds (IQR: 59 seconds to 4 minutes and 14 seconds). Two lines failed after placement, and one of the 34 successfully placed peripheral IJ lines (2.9%) had a complication – a local hematoma. There were, however, no arterial punctures or pneumothoraces. Although only eight of 34 lines were placed using sterile attire, there were no line infections. 

Conclusion: Our research adds to the growing body of evidence supporting US-guided peripheral internal jugular access as a safe and convenient procedure alternative for patients who have difficult IV access.

Introduction: Two-point compression ultrasound is purportedly a simple and accurate means to diagnose proximal lower extremity deep vein thrombosis (DVT), but the pitfalls of this technique have not been fully elucidated. The objective of this study is to determine the accuracy of emergency medicine resident-performed two-point compression ultrasound, and to determine what technical errors are commonly made by novice ultrasonographers using this technique.

Methods: This was a prospective diagnostic test assessment of a convenience sample of adult emergency department (ED) patients suspected of having a lower extremity DVT. After brief training on the technique, residents performed two-point compression ultrasounds on enrolled patients. Subsequently a radiology department ultrasound was performed and used as the gold standard. Residents were instructed to save videos of their ultrasounds for technical analysis.

Results: Overall, 288 two-point compression ultrasound studies were performed. There were 28 cases that were deemed to be positive for DVT by radiology ultrasound. Among these 28, 16 were identified by the residents with two-point compression. Among the 260 cases deemed to be negative for DVT by radiology ultrasound, 10 were thought to be positive by the residents using two-point compression. This led to a sensitivity of 57.1% (95% CI [38.8-75.5]) and a specificity of 96.1% (95% CI [93.8-98.5]) for resident-performed two-point compression ultrasound. This corresponds to a positive predictive value of 61.5% (95% CI 42.8% to 80.2%) and a negative predictive value of 95.4% (95% CI 92.9% to 98.0%).  The positive likelihood ratio is 14.9 (95% CI 7.5 to 29.5) and the negative likelihood ratio is 0.45 (95% CI 0.29 to 0.68). Video analysis revealed that in four cases the resident did not identify a DVT because the thrombus was isolated to the superior femoral vein (SFV), which is not evaluated by two-point compression. Moreover, the video analysis revealed that the most common mistake made by the residents was inadequate visualization of the popliteal vein.

Conclusion: Two-point compression ultrasound does not identify isolated SFV thrombi, which reduces its sensitivity. Moreover, this technique may be more difficult than previously reported, in part because novice ultrasonographers have difficulty properly assessing the popliteal vein.

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