You are providing care to a 54-year-old man patient complaining of chest pain. The patient asks to speak to you privately. He tells you he is taking Cialis for erectile dysfunction, and his wife does not know he is taking it.
He does not want his wife to find out. As you are putting the EMS bags back in the ambulance, the wife corners you and insists that you tell her what her husband said. What should you do?
A) You should tell her. As his spouse, she is legally entitled to know his medical information.
B) You should not tell her. There is no reason to humiliate your patient by disclosing his embarrassing condition.
C) You should not tell her. By law, your conversation with your patient is confidential.
D) You should tell her. He may be having an affair without her knowledge, and she needs to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases.
Question 2
You are on the scene in the bad part of town for an unresponsive 18-year-old type 1 diabetic patient. His mother states that he is very noncompliant with his diabetes management and goes unresponsive often due to low blood sugar. After performing the primary assessment, you believe that this is the most likely cause of his unresponsiveness. However, after taking a capillary glucose reading you are surprised to see that the patient's sugar level is normal. How will you now determine the field impression?
A) Recognize that the mother was lying to you. The patient is not diabetic and you now must assume that everything she told you is wrong.
B) Recognize that the mother is probably trying to protect her son from jail. Tell her that it is critical that she tell you what drugs he actually took.
C) Continue patient care by getting a complete SAMPLE history and perform a complete secondary assessment.
D) You cannot make a correct diagnosis in the field because you cannot perform all the necessary tests with your limited scope of practice.
Lung cancer. Photograph of part of a lung removed after death. The yellow area is a large tumor and
Barrel Chest for Patients who have COPD
Cross-sectional data showing that the amount of effort spent on personal health care increases with
Patient with osteoarthritis.
Pneumonia patient’s chest x-ray. Note the irregular areas of density.