Impending Doom

Impending Doom – Help Your Patient ‘Talk and Survive’!

If you have been missing the content from Cliff Reid on RESUS.ME like we all have…weep no more…he has returned and is back making more brilliant content on his YouTube Channel – well worth checking out.

Cliff starts us off on this series by looking at the patient that presents saying they’re ‘going to die’ – “The Impending Doom Patient“. We’ve all treated these patients, they’re the ones that stay with us, the ones we review over and over in our head, the ones we strive to do better for next time.

Originally described as “angor amini” by English physician John Alfred Ryle the sense of impending doom is defined as “the aura of a nervous storm having its origin in those medullary centres upon which the act of living depends“.

Cliff looks at the causes of this phenomena, the physiology and an approach to the talk and die patient, in the hope that with early recognition and the steps he walks us through we can hopefully reverse the impending doom they’re facing.

Click on image below to watch 13 minutes of educational gold on the Impending Doom Patient….

For more on this topic the team at Resuscitology have a podcast on recognising and reversing the Impending Doom patient:

References

• Ryle JA. Angor Animi, or the sense of dying. Guy’s Hospital Report. 1928; 78: 371-376
• Ryle JA. The sense of dying–a postscript. Guy’s Hospital Report. 1950; 99(4): 224-229.

Further Reading

• Reid C. Impending Doom – Help Your Patient ‘Talk and Survive’!
• Reid C. Haemorrhage Control Part 1: Principles and Cognitive Aid
• Reid C. Haemorrhage Control Part 2: Specific Measures in Severe Bleeding