Syncope and Sudden Cardiac Death – 18 Board-Style Cases with Answers

What this deck covers

Syncope and Sudden Cardiac Death in 18 board-style clinical cases with worked explanations. Each case gives you a clinical vignette, four options, the correct answer, and an explanation of why each of the other three is wrong, with the guideline or textbook it follows named on the answer.

Board-style teaching questions for paediatricians and trainees preparing for board, MRCPCH and Prometric examinations. Written from published guidelines and standard paediatric textbooks, with the source named on every answer.

The 18 cases, in order

1. Warned, and back in a minute
2. One of the four, not the others
3. The relative who cannot hear
4. Start before anything happens
5. Only the treadmill showed it
6. His father was thirty-four
7. White, after the bump
8. Everyone saw him twitch
9. Only the rate changed
10. What the parents are asking for
11. What she can do herself
12. Nobody asked about her periods
13. The noise that fools people
14. One line on the form
15. Nothing found is the finding
16. Before the pen touches the pad
17. He did not put his hands out
18. Always at the end of a bout

Diagnoses and management options tested

Across the 18 cases you are asked to choose between options such as: An inherited rhythm disorder, A seizure disorder triggered by immersion, Reflex fainting provoked by exertion, An inherited disorder of ventricular recovery, in, Epilepsy provoked by minor injury, Progressive disease of the heart muscle, of, Avoid school assemblies and any prolonged standing, An inherited rhythm disorder, in, Genetic testing of the sisters only, Refer for tilt table testing.

Clinical pearls from this deck

• A warning before and a clear head after. That is the ordinary faint.
• During exertion beats after it. No warning beats a warning. Those two questions do most of the work.
• A near-drowning in a good swimmer is a cardiac referral, not a swimming lesson.
• Treat before the first symptom. In this condition the first symptom can be the last one.
• A normal resting work-up in exertional collapse is not an answer. Put him on the treadmill.
• Collapse on the pitch plus a father who died young. Stop the sport before you finish the work-up.

Work through the deck once for recognition, then again a week later to test yourself — each question gives the answer and explains why every other option fails.

More from this system: all Cardiology Board Questions case decks · pediatric reference values.