Shoulder Injury Commonly Missed In Whiplash Victims
Shoulder Injury Commonly Missed In Whiplash Victims
(New Research 2008)
Image Compliments of Medical Legal Art via The Doe Report (www.doereport.com). Copyright © 2010 Medical Legal Art, All rights reserved. Triaging victims of a traumatic event takes very specific clinical skills. Many times, victims are categorized into loose groups oriented towards diagnosis based on “syndrome” rather than anatomical lesions. These groups include whiplash, cervicalgia, headache and lumbago, to name a few. The astute clinician will dig deeper to solve the diagnostic dilemma. In many cases, the only common factor between victims can be the mechanism of injury. Everyone reacts to traumatic forces differently. A recent article by Abbassian and Giddins (2008), demonstrated this syndrome-based diagnostic phenomenon in a prominent orthopedic journal, and outlined an often “missed” injury in traffic accident victims. In relation to traumatic shoulder injury, the authors stated, “The diagnosis is, however, frequently overlooked and shoulder pain is often attributed to pain radiating from the neck resulting in long delays before treatment” (Abbassian & Giddins, 2008) The authors found that only 27% of patients had a proper diagnosis. When working with clinicians, it is important to work with the best of the best. Accurate and efficient diagnosis is paramount to documenting causality to bodily injury and persistent functional loss.
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Reference:
Abbassian, A., & Giddins, G. E. (2008). Subacromial impingement in patients with whiplash injury to the cervical spine. Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery and Research, 3(25), Retrieved from http://www.josr-online.com/content/3/1/25