Degree Type
Honors Capstone Project
Date of Submission
Spring 5-1-2008
Capstone Advisor
Susan M. Wojcik
Honors Reader
William D. Grant
Capstone Major
Biology
Capstone College
Arts and Science
Audio/Visual Component
no
Capstone Prize Winner
no
Won Capstone Funding
no
Honors Categories
Sciences and Engineering
Subject Categories
Biology
Abstract
Annually a large number of patients seen in the emergency department are diagnosed with an ankle sprain. If not treated properly, these injuries can result in long term complications such as pain, swelling and instability. Appropriate patient discharge instructions using evidence based treatment principles can be utilized to avoid these complications. Many patients seen in the emergency department with a final diagnosis of ankle sprain receive x-rays to rule out a fracture, despite the development of the Ottawa Ankle Rules (OAR) to determine when x-rays are necessary. Use of the Ottawa Ankle Rules has been shown to decrease the number of necessary x-rays by 35%.
In this study, we conducted a retrospective chart review of patients discharged from theUniversityHospitalemergency department with a diagnosis of ankle sprain to determine: a) the quality and content of treatment and discharge instructions, b) the compliance with the Ottawa Ankle Rules for the determination of ordering an x-ray.
We found there to be inadequate documentation of the use of OAR in the Emergency department and that the discharge instructions given to patients were not at a level that would provide for the best recovery from the injury
Recommended Citation
Bég, Sama A., "Ankle Sprain Injuries in the ED: Assessing Quality of Discharge Instructions and Compliance of Physicians with Ottawa Ankle Rules" (2008). Honors Capstone Projects - All. 535.
https://surface.syr.edu/honors_capstone/535
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
