Assessing the patient in shock The clinical presentation of the patient will depend on the originating cause of shock and the stage of shock at which
CRITICAL CARE
Suzanne Bench
he/she is presenting. Three stages are identified (Table 1). However,depending on the underlying pathology,and on the age and premorbid status of the patient, these stages may not always be clearly definable, because the body becomes unable to maintain the compensatory mechanisms (Schulman,2003). See case study (Figure 2) for an example of the clinical presentation of a patient in shock.