ER Docs urged to ask young heart patients about cocaine use
Sign of the times.
Younger ER patients with heart attack symptoms
should be asked whether they’ve recently used cocaine, which can cause similar
chest pain…
Two typical heart attack treatments can be dangerous to those using cocaine:
• Clot-busting drugs carry an extra risk of bleeding into the brain in patients whose blood pressure is high due to cocaine use.
• Betablockers that can lower blood pressure without constricting arteries in typical heart attack patients have the opposite effect in cocaine users, raising blood pressure and squeezing cocaine-narrowed arteries.
Reiffel said doctors should explain why it’s important to know if a patient is using cocaine. He said that admitting use of an illegal substance is confidential information that won’t be reported to law enforcement. “The caregiver is not here to judge.”
Even if the patient is an idiot.
Two typical heart attack treatments can be dangerous to those using cocaine:
• Clot-busting drugs carry an extra risk of bleeding into the brain in patients whose blood pressure is high due to cocaine use.
• Betablockers that can lower blood pressure without constricting arteries in typical heart attack patients have the opposite effect in cocaine users, raising blood pressure and squeezing cocaine-narrowed arteries.
Reiffel said doctors should explain why it’s important to know if a patient is using cocaine. He said that admitting use of an illegal substance is confidential information that won’t be reported to law enforcement. “The caregiver is not here to judge.”
Even if the patient is an idiot.
Posted: Thu - March 20, 2008 at 05:46 AM