Background: Guidelines recommend in-hospital evaluation with cardiac monitoring and transthoracic echocardiogram (TTE) to assess syncope in patients that are considered high-risk for major adverse cardiovascular events. We sought to identify variables associated with performing TTE in patients presenting with syncope. Methods: We abstracted demographic and clinical data from all patients evaluated for syncope at the [...]

Background: Syncope is a common presentation encountered by hospitals worldwide. While well-established guidelines exist, there is significant variation in practice regarding the investigation and management of these patients. Practitioners tend to over-investigate, which may lead to unnecessary hospitalizations, length of stay and cost. In this study, we analyzed the utilization of healthcare resources for patients [...]

Case Presentation: Patient is a 53 year old African American male with past medical history of hypertension who presented with syncope. He had this episode a total of 3 times, most recently 1 month prior and initial episode 1 year prior. He had resolution of symptoms both times and diagnostic workup did not reveal any [...]

Case Presentation: A 63-year-old man with history of recurrent syncope and atrial fibrillation (AF) on warfarin presented to our hospital with headache. Within the last year, he had suffered several falls due to syncope, which resulted in serious injuries, including jaw fracture and subdural hematomas (SDH). He used alcohol and marijuana daily. Previous workup for [...]

Case Presentation: A 57-year-old Hispanic man with a past medical history of essential hypertension and nephrolithiasis, presents to the emergency room with a witnessed syncopal event lasting less than a minute. He also refers a two day history of subjective fever and dysuria associated with nausea and anorexia. Further review of systems was unremarkable. He [...]

Case Presentation: A 24-year-old gentleman gentleman presented to the emergency room complaining of left precordial discomfort and syncopal event at work. His system review was negative. He acknowledged using marijuana with the last usage being the morning of presentation. His initial EKG revealed sinus bradycardia (Figure A). His preliminary blood work revealed normal chemistry, TSH. [...]