Abstract
The management of traumatic injuries requires the coordinated efforts of a multidisciplinary
team of trauma surgeons, subsurgical specialties, intensivists, and interventionalists.
The interventional radiologist plays a critical role in the management of acute trauma
by offering 24-hour consultation, expert imaging interpretation, and an array of life-saving
minimally invasive procedures. As integrated members of the multidisciplinary clinical
team, the interventional radiologist should be able to review clinical information,
communicate clearly with consulting services, perform timely intervention, provide
postprocedural follow-up, and document relevant information in the patient chart.
The following review provides a stepwise approach to the rapid clinical assessment
of the trauma patient and outlines the pathways taken by the trauma patient to the
interventional radiology suite.
Keywords
trauma - hemodynamic instability - interventional radiology
