[Gnumed-devel] Number of Active Problems before death is a certainty.

[Richard Terry]

Just out of interest, how many currently active significan health problems do 
you reckon a patient can have and still be alive??

I do ask this for a reason, as I muck round with the ergonomics of screen 
design.

I trawled my database and found up to 20 are not uncommon in chronically ill 
patients, with the record being 27 just prior to death. You may disagree with 
the apparent duplication of some of the things on my problem list (eg 
different sites of his vascular disease) but they were all there for a reason  
eg the lumbar back pain was  a chronic pain managment problems, and the 
various vascular diseases needed different time scale follow up.  The second 
list is a still alive grossly obese lady who just survied a massive pulmonary 
embolus, with the clot on a Chest CT extending from main pulmnary artery into 
both right and left pulmonary arteries!!
======================
Patient1 (dead now - not surprising
======================
Renal stones
lumbar back pain
recurrent urinary tract infections
Contrast Dye Allergy
Cervical spine pain
Chronic pancreatitis
glomerulonephritis
chronic renal failure
Reflux Eosophagitis
gout
cerebrovascular insufficiency -TIA's
Peripheral Vascular Disease
colonic polyps
emphysema
Internal Carotid Artery stenosis
hypertension
ischaemic heart disease
hypercholesterolaemia
abdominal aortic aneurysm
Night cramps in legs
Vertigo
NIDDM
iliac artery stenosis
renal colic
Renal artery stenosis
acute on chronic renal failure
Haemodialysis
===================
Patient 2
===================
hypertension    
low back pains  
NIDDM   
hypercholesterolaemia   
irritable bowel syndrome        
Cervical spine pain     
Bladder  incontinence   
carpal tunnel syndrome  
ulcerative oesophagitis 
gout    
heart failure   
anaemia of chronic disease
renal failure   
Internal Carotid Artery stenosis        
Iron deficiency anaemia (acute) 
Warfarinised    
osteoporosis    
raised PTH + Vit D deficienc y
Fosamax started 

Regards

Richard