Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension – Board-Style Questions

What this deck covers

idiopathic intracranial hypertension 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 paediatric board, MRCPCH and licensing examinations. Written from published guidelines and standard paediatric textbooks, with the source named on every answer.

The 18 cases, in order

1. The number that matters
2. Before the needle
3. How she lies
4. The acne tablets
5. Who gets it young
6. Double on looking sideways
7. The first field change
8. Discs that only look swollen
9. The sound in her ear
10. The first medicine
11. Pins and needles
12. When vision is going fast
13. A second drug
14. Back again
15. After the steroids stopped
16. Ear pain, then headache
17. What is tracked at clinic
18. What they fear most

Diagnoses and management options tested

Across the 18 cases you are asked to choose between options such as: A protein level that is above the upper normal limit, Imaging to exclude a mass and a clot in a dural sinus, Sitting upright, which gives the most accurate reading, Iron deficiency from very heavy periods, Before puberty both sexes are equally affected, A third nerve palsy with a dilated pupil, A complete homonymous hemianopia, Hypertensive retinopathy from renal disease, Pulsatile tinnitus, common in this condition, A three-day course of high-dose intravenous methylprednisolone, Worsening pressure causing sensory loss, Increase the acetazolamide and review in clinic in a month, Topiramate, which can also aid weight loss, A new tumour that was missed on the original scan.

Clinical pearls from this deck

• Children: pressure over 280 mm of water is raised.
• Swollen discs: image the brain before the needle.
• Pressure is read lying on the side, legs out, calm.
• Acne tablets plus swollen discs: think tetracycline.
• Before puberty: boys and girls alike, often slim.
• Double vision on looking sideways: the sixth nerve.

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 Neurology case decks · pediatric reference values.