OBJECTIVE This study describes the cause, management, and outcomes of abdominal injury in a mature deployed military trauma system, with particular focus on damage control, hollow visceral injury (HVI), and stoma utilization. BACKGROUND Damage control laparotomy (DCL) is established in military and civilian practice. However, optimal management of HVI during military DCL remains controversial...

Four adults injured in serious road-traffic accidents developed pneumoperitoneum after artificial ventilation. No case could be attributed to injury or to perforation of a hollow viscus in the belly, but doubt about this in one patient resulted in exploratory laparotomy. In three patients the origin of intraperitoneal air was considered to be leakage through minute ruptures in alveoli subjected...

BACKGROUND The reported incidence of hollow viscus injuries (HVI) in blunt trauma patients is approximately 1%. The most common site of injury to the intestine in blunt abdominal trauma (BAT) is the small bowel followed by colon, with mesenteric injuries occurring three times more commonly than bowel injuries. Isolated colon injury is a rarely encountered condition. Clinical assessment alone in...

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to describe pelvic fractures and their associated injuries in service members who either died of wounds or were killed in action during Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom and define any differences in associated injuries between penetrating versus blunt injury to the pelvis. METHODS A review of all service members who sustained a pe...

early detection of free air in the peritoneal cavity is vital in diagnosis of life-threatening emergencies, and can play a significant role in expediting treatment. we present a series of cases in which bedside ultrasound (us) in the emergency department accurately identified evidence of free intra-peritoneal air and echogenic (dirty) free fluid consistent with a surgical final diagnosis of a p...

Early detection of free air in the peritoneal cavity is vital in diagnosis of life-threatening emergencies, and can play a significant role in expediting treatment. We present a series of cases in which bedside ultrasound (US) in the emergency department accurately identified evidence of free intra-peritoneal air and echogenic (dirty) free fluid consistent with a surgical final diagnosis of a p...