Surviving On-Call: Sorting Out the Unstable Patient with an Unstable Pelvic Ring Injury
Surviving On-Call: Sorting Out the Unstable Patient with an Unstable Pelvic Ring Injury
The responsibility of on-call duty is no small task, regardless of your subspecialty interests, experience level or years in practice. Few patients challenge our on-call abilities more than the unstable patient with an unstable pelvic ring disruption. Over the past few decades, on-call orthopaedic surgeons have evolved from reactive clinicians, tasked with caring for whoever survives until morning, to being active participants in the initial evaluation and resuscitation team. No longer is memorizing the Young-Burgess (or Pennal-Tile) classification and knowing how to apply a pelvic external fixation device viewed as being sufficiently prepared.