Acute Medicine | Cardiovascular | Syncope: Guidelines and treatment

Syncope: Guidelines and Treatment
Session Overview
Description
This session explains the European Society of Cardiology guidelines on the investigation and management of syncope.

Learning Objectives
By the end of this session you will be able to:

• Apply European Society of Cardiology (ESC) guidelines in evaluating syncope
• Take informed action to initiate treatment of vasovagal syncope

Prerequisites
Before commencing this session you should:

• Be familiar with syncope and its classification
• Complete session: History in Collapse (003-0075)

Syncope is characterised by:

• Rapid onset of symptoms
• Brief loss of consciousness
• Loss of muscle tone and body posture which usually results in a fall
• Spontaneous, rapid and, usually, complete recovery in most cases

Urinary incontinence can also be seen if there is a full bladder, due to loss of muscle tone.

Patients often report feeling very tired and drained for quite a while afterwards. Retrograde amnesia is less common.

Presyncope, or near-syncope, refers to the presence of prodromal symptoms of imminent syncope like fading visual fields, nausea, sweating and weakness, etc.

Jerks and twitches
There may be occasional myoclonic jerks or twitches, which can lead a bystander to assume, falsely, that a seizure disorder exists.