Misdiagnosis of Acute Headache: Mitigating Medico-legal Risks

Abstract

Headache is a common complaint of patients in the emergency department. The large majority of them have self-limited causes but some have life, limb, brain, or vision-threatening secondary causes. The job of the emergency physicians is to distinguish the 2 groups. This article focuses on clinical tips to avoid or at least mitigate medico-legal risk in patients with headache. Each process of care-history, physical examination, laboratory testing, brain imaging, spinal fluid analysis, specialist consultation, and documentation-will be considered.

Keywords: Acute headache; Misdiagnosis; Physical examination; Subarachnoid hemorrhage; Thunderclap headache.