What's Old, What's New, What's Outside the Box: Managing Pulmonary Embolism in Your ICU

Bonus CE Session Moderator(s)

• 

  Ronald Sing, DO, FCCM

  Professor of Surgery
  Carolinas Medical Center
  Charlotte, North Carolina
• 

  Gretchen Brophy, BCPS, PharmD, FCCP

  Professor of Pharmacotherapy & Outcomes Sciences and Neurosurgery
  Virginia Commonwealth University
  Glen Allen, VA

Pulmonary embolism (PE) presents with a variety of nonspecific symptoms. Confirmation of diagnosis involves clinical risk scores, scanning techniques, and laboratory tests. Treatment choice is guided by the risks and benefits of each strategy. New techniques and medications have been developed during the past few years. It is recommended that high-risk patients with PEs receive thrombolytic therapy or thrombectomy. Patients with less severe presentations are treated with anticoagulants, traditionally with parenteral heparins in the acute phase of treatment, transitioning to oral vitamin K antagonists (VKAs). The limitations of these agents and the introduction of non-VKA oral anticoagulants challenge this paradigm. This session will focus on the varying methodologies for prevention, management, and novel ways to remove the large pulmonary clot burden safely.

Presentations:

• Prevention Is Always the Key: Strategies to Prevent Deep Venous Thrombosis and Pulmonary Emboli in Challenging ICU Patients
• Filtering Out the Bad Clot and Removing It in the End: When Should IVC Filters Be Used and When Should They Be Removed?
• Thinking Outside the Proverbial Pulmonary Embolus Box: Novel Catheter-Based Technologies for Busting Clots in the Pulmonary Vessels