Determination of Demographic Changes of Acute Pulmonary Embolism Patients Applied to Emergency Service: Retrospective Analysis of 60 Cases

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study was to determine the clinical and demographical traits of the increasing number of patients diagnosed with pulmonary embolism and hence to contribute to the literature in order to analyze the possible changes occurred in time. Our study is a retrospective study conducted with all patients over the age of 18 who applied to the emergency service and diagnosed with pulmonary embolism between 01.01.2017 and 01.01.2019. Demographic and clinical data of patients such as patients’ complaints, background story, physical examination and laboratory inspections were determined by analyzing physical files formed at the application and saved data in the information system, and relationship between all the data was analyzed by determination of calculated wells criteria scores. Results: A total of 60 patients were included in the study. The average age of the patients was 64.46 (16.95). Among the patients, 34 (56.7%) were female while 26 (43.3%) were male. Shortness of breath and chest-back pain were the leading complaints of emergency service applications by 36 (60%) and 16 (26%), respectively. The leading background stories of the cases were malignity with 14 (23%) patients, and hypertension with 12 (20%) patients. The most common physical examination indication was bruit with 21 (35%) patients and pretibial edema with 11 (18%) patients, while 12 (20%) patients did not show any symptom. Thrombolytic treatment was applied to 4 patients in the emergency service. Conclusion We believe that studies investigating demographic traits of life-critical and easy to skip diseases like pulmonary embolism which causes to apply to the emergency service will contribute to diagnosis.