June 2019; papers of the month

Status Epilepticus in children, lying and standing blood pressures in syncope or presyncope and decompressing paediatric tension pneumothoraces. You'll no doubt have seen and heard about the two papers published this month in the Lancet, both Consept and Eclipse look at the use of keppra vs phenytoin as a second line anti convulsant therapy for children in status epilepticus. We take a look at both papers, and have a think about what this means for practice. There has been a large amount of focus on the optimal position for needle decompression of tension pneumothoraces in adults, but an open access paper from SJTREM looks at the best position in children, take a look at the paper here. Finally, should all patients with a presentation of syncope/presyncope be getting a lying and standing blood pressure, or is it an ineffective test? Make sure you take a look at the papers yourself, remembering that the paper from SJTREM on paediatric pneumothoraces is totally open access. We'd love to hear your thoughts and comments. Enjoy! Simon & Rob