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EXPERIENCE AND REASON: Robert E. Kaplan and Kathleen A. Lillis Recurrent Nursemaid’s Elbow (Annular Ligament Displacement) Treatment Via Telephone Pediatrics 2002; 110: 171-174 [Abstract] [Full text] [PDF]

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Parental treatment of nursemaid's elbow with telephone advice

Leonard Levy   (4 July 2002)

Recurrent Nursemaid's Elbow Treatment Via Telephone

Kathleen A Lillis, Robert E. Kaplan   (9 July 2002)

Parental treatment of nursemaid's elbow with telephone advice 4 July 2002
Leonard Levy, Pediatrician, solo practice N/A Send letter to journal: Re: Parental treatment of nursemaid's elbow with telephone advice llevy1{at}twcny.rr.com Leonard Levy	Many years ago, during a blizzard in Central New York, I provided telephone advice to a mother whose child clearly had nursemaid's elbow. I had safely reached home before the storm, and mother and child were at their home. Weather conditions prevented any more safe travel. The mother clearly understood that there was some risk to the pronation maneuver, but also knew that it would be 24 hours or more before she and the child could reach medical care. So she and I both accepted the risk, and the maneuver was successful; I do not remember how many attempts it took. There is, in the military medical records of WWII, an account of a sailor who underwent successful appendectomy on a submarine, done by a corpsman with radio advice from superiors. Recently, there has been news of a woman physician in Antarctica who performed a breast biopsy on herself with electronic advice from other distant medical personnel. This present report adds to that body of literature, and should not surprise us. Leonard Levy, MD, FAAP Fayetteville NY 13066
Recurrent Nursemaid's Elbow Treatment Via Telephone 9 July 2002
Kathleen A Lillis, Pediatric Emergency Medicine physician Children's Hospital of Buffalo, Robert E. Kaplan Send letter to journal: Re: Recurrent Nursemaid's Elbow Treatment Via Telephone klillis{at}upa.chob.edu Kathleen A Lillis, et al.	We greatly appreciate Dr. Levy sharing his experience, insight and observations. We believe that physicians have been treating nursemaid's elbow via telephone in a prudent and skilled manner for a long time. Dr. Levy proves this. One of the primary goals of our paper is to document, in the literature, the legitimacy of telephone treatment when a prudent and competent medical professional instructs a nonmedical caretaker. Robert E. Kaplan, MD Kathleen A. Lillis, MD Children's Hospital of Buffalo Buffalo, NY