Pleural Disease – Dr. Karin Halvorson – September 9, 2016

By Nathan Nielsen / September 9, 2016

PLEURAL EFFUSION PEARLS:

Virtually all patients with a newly discovered pleural effusion should undergo thoracentesis to aid in diagnosis and management.
Fever with a new pleural effusion is a medical emergency and mandates a diagnostic tap (do not let the sun set or rise on this clinical scenario)
Complicated pleural effusion and empyema require chest tubes
Routine studies: cell count and differential, protein, LDH, glucose, cytology, pH, culture
Consider: BNP, albumin, ADA, mesothelin

Karin Halvorson trained in Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine at UIC Chicago followed by a Fellowship in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Brown University. At Brown she worked under James Klinger, MD and Corey Ventetuolo, MD, who currently run the Pulmonary Hypertension Center there. She is fascinated by this ever evolving field. She is currently the ICU Director at the Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care Center with a Faculty appointment at Tulane University.

Dr. Karin Halvorson earned her medical degree from the University of Hawaii. She completed a combined residency in Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Subsequently she attended Brown University for her Pulmonary and Critical Care Fellowship. While at Brown she was inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society and earned the 2014 Fellow Teaching Award. She served as the liaison between the emergency department and the intensive care unit during her time at Brown.

Dr. Halvorson is the Medical Director of Critical Care at Tulane University Medical Center where she splits her time between the MICU and the ED. Dr. Halvorson’s research interests are on ED to ICU transitions and optimizing early critical care. She is also invested in medical education and works with Housestaff on Quality Improvement Projects for Tulane University Medical Center.

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