Biomedical subjects

W R Ahrens

Publications and source records attributed to W R Ahrens.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed1998

Coping with pediatric death in the ED by learning from parental experience.

The death of a pediatric patient in the emergency department generates an intense emotional response in the physician and staff. A majority of emergency physicians describe this as the most stressful event in emergency medicine. Few emergency physicians are instructed in the complexities of dealing with the death of a child. The authors have developed a teaching module that introduces aspects of pediatric death-telling through the eyes of parents who have personally experienced the death of a child.

Attitude to Death↗

PubMed1998

Songs of innocence and experience: student's poems about their medical education.

Personal creative writing is increasingly used in medical schools to foster self-reflection. This article looks particularly at poetry as a vehicle for expressing personal experiences of professional development. The authors present a series of poems written by students at their medical school. In them, the students reflect on embryology, gross anatomy, telling (or not telling) bad news to trusting patients (and family members), encountering death, and encountering their own anger and frustration with the demands of medicine. These poems not only capture individual students' feelings and imaginations but also demonstrate the students' constant struggle to sustain their idealism about medicine throughout the four years of their education.

Education, Medical↗

PubMed1997

Emergency physicians' experience with pediatric death.

Based on the hypothesis that managing pediatric death--particularly, communicating with survivors--is extremely difficult for most emergency physicians, 122 general emergency physicians at a written board review course were surveyed to assess their attitudes toward pediatric death. Sixty-six percent reported that communicating with the family of a child who had died was the most difficult experience in emergency medicine. Sixty-six percent considered communication with the family of a child who had died to be much more difficult than communication with the family of an adult who had died. Sixty-four percent reported feelings of guilt or inadequacy after unsuccessful pediatric resuscitation, and 47% reported feeling impaired for the remainder of their shift. Only 8% of physicians were aware of published guidelines regarding managing pediatric emergency department (ED) deaths, and only 14% of physicians had ever had any training in death notification. Ninety-two percent of physicians responded that a course directed toward managing the family of a child who had died in the ED would be helpful in dealing with this difficult situation.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Massive hemoptysis in a child due to pulmonary arteriovenous malformation.

Hemoptysis due to pulmonary arteriovenous malformation (PAVM) is rare in pediatric patients, but it must be included in the differential diagnosis of hemoptysis after other etiologies are excluded. We present a case of an 11-yr-old girl who presented with massive hemoptysis due to a PAVM.

Age Factors↗