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PE and clots?
My father who is 86 years old, has a history of heart failure takes blood pressure and blood thinner medications was in the ER yesterday. He had a very swollen left leg from the knee down and the leg has a bruise. The doctors did a D-Dimer blood test which was rather elevated, now when they took a CT scan they did not find any clot and all the doctors told him was to follow up with his primary physician. I am a bit concerned that he still might have a clot and if not I need to have some sort of an idea of what else could be going on. I’d like to have a little peace of mind regarding my father and his health.
2 Answers
If the swelling is only in the left leg, then it is not heart failure causing the swelling. The elevated D-dimer has me worried too. It could be that the clot was not defined when the hospital did the CT scan. If I were the duty physician, I would have ordered an ultrasound exam to make sure.
Yours truly,
Dr. Richard Evan (Rick) Steele
He needs to see his doctor. An elevated D dimer can mean many things---such as CHF. I can't diagnose him without seeing him.