A Visual Guide to ECG Interpretation

Preface

Now in its third edition, the objective of this book remains unchanged—to provide a visual tool that will help physicians and other emergency clinicians quickly recognize important ECG patterns. By the end of the book, the reader will have developed a mental repertoire of ECGs that represent medically significant conditions, including some that are potentially fatal. We hope that our illustrations and easy-to-follow explanations help demystify ECG inter pretation. This book is intentionally graphic and nontechnical. It is designed to help clinicians make visual diagnoses by highlighting abnormalities in a colorful and pictorial fashion. The third edition maintains the same format as the previous one. An ECG is first shown in its native state to give the reader a chance to recognize and interpret salient features. Abnormal patterns are enlarged, highlighted

in color, and described in brief on the following page. In the third edition, we have provided more enlarged illustrations and callouts, highlighting the nuances of key ECG patterns. We have added new ECGs and included those that emphasized critical pathologies, including hyperkalemia, coronary occlusion, and right ventricular dysfunction. In the ischemia chapter 13, we included ECGs with more subtle signs of coronary occlusion. In keeping with the evolution of cardiology, we have added ECGs for patients with left ventricular assist devices. The third edition is accompanied by an accessible, online appendix that presents ECG abnormalities in random order. We hope this will allow our readers to practice and consolidate their learning. We would like to thank everyone who contributed electrocardiograms to this collection.

Copyright © 2021 Wolters Kluwer, Inc. Unauthorized reproduction of the content is prohibited.

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