Diagnostic Tests for Ulnar Neuropathy
Ulnar Neuropathy Tests: Book Excerpts
Home Diagnostic Testing
These home medical tests may be relevant to Ulnar Neuropathy:
- High Cholesterol: Home Testing:
- High Blood Pressure: Home Testing
- Heart Health: Home Testing:
- Thyroid: Home Testing:
- Diet & Weight Loss: Home Testing:
- Adrenal Gland Health: Home Testing:
- Kidney Health: Home Testing:
- Diabetes: Related Home Testing:
- Nerve Neuropathy: Related Home Testing:
Ulnar Neuropathy Diagnosis: Book Excerpts
Diagnostic Tests for Ulnar Neuropathy: Online Medical Books
16 MEDICAL BOOKS ONLINE!
Review excerpts from medical books online, free, without registration,
for more information about the diagnostic tests for Ulnar Neuropathy.
Arm pain:
History and physical examination
(Handbook of Signs & Symptoms (Third Edition))
If the patient reports arm pain after an injury, take a brief history of the injury from the patient. Then quickly assess him for severe injuries requiring immediate treatment. If you’ve ruled out severe injuries, check pulses, capillary refill time, sensation, and movement distal to the affected area because circulatory impairment or nerve injury may require immediate surgery. Inspect the arm for deformities, assess the level of pain, and immobilize the arm to prevent further injury.
If the patient reports continuous or intermittent arm pain, ask him to describe it and to relate when it began. Is the pain associated with repetitive or specific movements or positions? Ask him to point out other painful areas because arm pain may be referred. For example, arm pain commonly accompanies the characteristic chest pain of myocardial infarction, and right shoulder pain may be referred from the right upper quadrant abdominal pain of cholecystitis. Ask the patient if the pain worsens in the morning or in the evening, if it prevents him from performing his job, and if it restricts movement. Also ask if heat, rest, or drugs relieve it. Finally, ask about preexisting illnesses, a family history of gout or arthritis, and current drug therapy.
Next, perform a focused examination. Observe the way the patient walks, sits, and holds his arm. Inspect the entire arm, comparing it with the opposite arm for symmetry, movement, and muscle atrophy. (It’s important to know if the patient is right- or left-handed.) Palpate the entire arm for swelling, nodules, and tender areas. In both arms, compare active range of motion, muscle strength, and reflexes.
If the patient reports numbness or tingling, check his sensation to vibration, temperature, and pinprick. Compare bilateral hand grasps and shoulder strength to detect weakness.
If a patient has a cast, splint, or restrictive dressing, check for circulation, sensation, and mobility distal to the dressing. Ask the patient about edema and if the pain has worsened within the last 24 hours.
Examine the neck for pain on motion, point tenderness, muscle spasms, or arm pain when the neck is extended with the head toward the involved side. (See Arm pain: Common causes and associated findings.)
» READ BOOK EXCERPT ONLINE »
Source: Handbook of Signs & Symptoms (Third Edition), 2006
Arm pain:
History and physical examination
(Professional Guide to Signs & Symptoms (Fifth Edition))
If the patient reports arm pain after an injury, take a brief history of the injury from the patient. Then quickly assess him for severe injuries requiring immediate treatment. If you’ve ruled out severe injuries, check pulses, capillary refill time, sensation, and movement distal to the affected area because circulatory impairment or nerve injury may require immediate surgery. Inspect the arm for deformities, assess the level of pain, and immobilize the arm to prevent further injury.
If the patient reports continuous or intermittent arm pain, ask him to describe it and to relate when it began. Is the pain associated with repetitive or specific movements or positions? Ask him to point out other painful areas because arm pain may be referred. For example, arm pain commonly accompanies the characteristic chest pain of myocardial infarction, and right shoulder pain may be referred from the right-upper-quadrant abdominal pain of cholecystitis. Ask the patient if the pain worsens in the morning or in the evening, if it prevents him from performing his job, and if it restricts any movements. Also ask if heat, rest, or drugs relieve it. Finally, ask about any preexisting illnesses, a family history of gout or arthritis, and current drug therapy.
Next, perform a focused examination. Observe the way the patient walks, sits, and holds his arm. Inspect the entire arm, comparing it with the opposite arm for symmetry, movement, and muscle atrophy. (It’s important to know if the patient is right- or left-handed.) Palpate the entire arm for swelling, nodules, and tender areas. In both arms, compare active range of motion, muscle strength, and reflexes.
If the patient reports numbness or tingling, check his sensation to vibration, temperature, and pinprick. Compare bilateral hand grasps and shoulder strength to detect weakness.
If the patient has a cast, splint, or restrictive dressing, check for circulation, sensation, and mobility distal to the dressing. Ask the patient about edema and if the pain has worsened within the last 24 hours.
Examine the neck for pain on motion, point tenderness, muscle spasms, or arm pain when the neck is extended with the head toward the involved side. (See Arm pain: Causes and associate findings.)
» READ BOOK EXCERPT ONLINE »
Source: Professional Guide to Signs & Symptoms (Fifth Edition), 2006
Peripheral Neuropathy:
Diagnostic Approach
(Field Guide to Bedside Diagnosis)
Sensory neuropathy symptoms include positive phenomena such as tingling; pins/needles; and burning, cold, or lancinating pain. Physical findings include weakness, fasciculations, atrophy, ataxia, wide-based gait, abnormal sweating, decreased or absent deep tendon reflexes, orthostatic hypotension, hypesthesia surrounded by a zone of hyperesthesia, and vibration or position sense affected before pinprick or temperature sense.
Autonomic neuropathy symptoms include impotence, retrograde ejaculation, diaphoresis, incontinence, urinary retention, constipation, diarrhea, orthostatic dizziness, and flushing. Physical findings include delayed pupillary light response, resting tachycardia, sinus arrhythmia, and orthostatic hypotension.
Sensory loss confined to part of a limb suggests injury to a peripheral nerve, plexus, or spinal root, resulting from trauma, entrapment, or vascular insufficiency. Mononeuropathy multiplex affects multiple nerves over time (e.g., due to diabetes or vasculitis). Polyneuropathy occurs in a stocking-glove distribution starting with the longest nerves, and is due to axonal neuropathy, with a toxic or metabolic origin. Bilaterally symmetrical symptoms are found in polyneuropathy or spinal cord lesions, while unilateral involvement is seen in contralateral disease of the brainstem, thalamus, or cortex.
Injury to large myelinated nerves produces decreased light touch and proprioception with a sensation of “walking on a thick carpet” or imbalance. Injury to medium fibers causes decreased light touch and vibration sense. Injury to small unmyelinated fibers, as occurs in diabetes or amyloidosis, decreases pain and temperature sensation and produces dysesthesias. Disproportionate loss of vibration sense and proprioception compared with pain and temperature sensation occurs with diseases of the dorsal column of the spinal cord (e.g., neurosyphilis, vitamin B 12 deficiency, or multiple sclerosis) and demyelinating polyneuropathy.
Transverse cord lesions produce loss of all modalities below the level of the lesion and a band of hyperalgesia at the level of the lesion. Lateral cord compression is heralded by early sensory changes. Dorsal cord compression affects proprioception and tactile discrimination without pain or temperature loss. Pernicious anemia and tabes dorsalis preferentially affect the dorsal columns.
» READ BOOK EXCERPT ONLINE »
Source: Field Guide to Bedside Diagnosis, 2007
Arm pain:
Physical assessment
(Signs & Symptoms: A 2-in-1 Reference for Nurses)
Perform a focused examination. Observe the way the patient walks, sits, and holds his arm. Inspect the entire arm, comparing it with the opposite arm for symmetry, movement, and muscle atrophy. (It’s important to know if the patient is right- or left-handed.) Palpate the entire arm for swelling, nodules, and tender areas. In both arms, compare active range of motion, muscle strength, and reflexes.
If the patient reports numbness or tingling, check his sensation to vibration, temperature, and pinprick. Compare bilateral hand grasps and shoulder strength to detect weakness.
If a patient has a cast, splint, or restrictive dressing, check for circulation, sensation, and mobility distal to the dressing. Ask the patient about edema and if the pain has worsened within the last 24 hours.
Examine the neck for pain on motion, point tenderness, muscle spasms, or arm pain when the neck is extended with the head toward the involved side.
» READ BOOK EXCERPT ONLINE »
Source: Signs & Symptoms: A 2-in-1 Reference for Nurses, 2007
Arm pain:
History and physical examination
(Nursing: Interpreting Signs and Symptoms)
If the patient reports arm pain after an injury, take a brief history of the injury from the patient. Quickly assess him for severe injuries requiring immediate treatment. If you've ruled out severe injuries, check pulses, capillary refill time, sensation, and movement distal to the affected area because circulatory impairment or nerve injury may require immediate surgery. Inspect the arm for deformities, assess the level of pain, and immobilize the arm to prevent further injury.
If the patient reports continuous or intermittent arm pain, ask him to describe it and to relate when it began. Is the pain associated with repetitive or specific movements or positions? Ask him to point out other painful areas because arm pain may be referred. For example, arm pain commonly accompanies the characteristic chest pain of myocardial infarction, and right shoulder pain may be referred from the right upper quadrant abdominal pain of cholecystitis. Ask the patient if the pain worsens in the morning or in the evening, if it prevents him from performing his job, and if it restricts movement. Ask if heat, rest, or drugs relieve it. Finally, ask about preexisting illnesses, a family history of gout or arthritis, and current drug therapy.
Next, perform a focused examination. Observe the way the patient walks, sits, and holds his arm. Inspect the entire arm, comparing it with the opposite arm for symmetry, movement, and muscle atrophy. (It's important to know if the patient is right- or left-handed.) Palpate the entire arm for swelling, nodules, and tender areas. In both arms, compare active range of motion, muscle strength, and reflexes.
If the patient reports numbness or tingling, check his sensation to vibration, temperature, and pinprick. Compare bilateral hand grasps and shoulder strength to detect weakness.
If a patient has a cast, splint, or restrictive dressing, check for circulation, sensation, and mobility distal to the dressing. Ask the patient about edema and if the pain has worsened within the last 24 hours.
Examine the neck for pain on motion, point tenderness, muscle spasms, or arm pain when the neck is extended with the head toward the involved side.
» READ BOOK EXCERPT ONLINE »
Source: Nursing: Interpreting Signs and Symptoms, 2007
Almost half of all people with diabetes experience some form of nerve damage, which can develop into a complication known as peripheral neuropathy....
Treating nerve damage from diabetes requires a two-pronged approach: controlling blood sugar and alleviating the pain caused by peripheral...
If you've been diagnosed with angina, how often you need to be monitored will depend on the severity of the angina. Tune in to learn more about...
Do you suffer from chest pain while exercising? If so, you may want to see a doctor. Join experts as they talk about the various methods used to...
See full list of 5 related videos
» Next page: Diagnosis of Ulnar Neuropathy
Rate This Website
What do you think about the features of this website?
Take our user survey and have your say:
Website User Survey
Medical Tools & Articles:
Next articles:
Tools & Services:
Medical Articles:
Forums & Message Boards
- Ask or answer a question at the Boards:
