Clinical Practice and Cases in Emergency Medicine

Introduction: This case report of renal vein thrombosis found on emergency bedside ultrasound illustrates the expanding role of point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) in rapidly identifying rare renal pathologies.

Case Report: A 16-year-old female with a complex medical history presenting with right-sided abdominal pain and tenderness was found to have significant renal POCUS findings consistent with renal vein thrombosis.

Conclusion: In the medically complex patient with nonspecific chief complaints, it can be challenging to rapidly narrow a broad differential diagnosis. Point-of-care ultrasound has proven to be an extremely useful tool for this purpose. As emergency physicians become more proficient in the use of ultrasonography, it is likely that POCUS will be used with increasing frequency to identify additional pathology outside its traditional applications.