Auscultation Skills: Breath and Heart Sounds, Fourth Edition is the only book-and-audio-CD product on the market that offers full coverage of heart and breath sounds from the simple to the complex and provides a comprehensive text explaining heart and breath sound fundamentals including basic anatomy and physiology, best auscultation locations, tips on how to identify each sound, and what to document. This product offers practicing nurses, nurse practitioners, and physician assistants a solid basis for recognizing and differentiating among abnormal breath and heart sounds to help them accurately interpret what they hear and then apply that knowledge toward a proper diagnosis and treatment regimen.

The book is supplemented with an all-in-one CD that features 46 tracks of breath sounds and 50 tracks of heart sounds, which can be listened to sequentially with the book or reviewed in any order the reader chooses. The CD can be listened to in the car or on the computer; it can be downloaded to the computer and converted to MP3 files.

Tips and alerts abound throughout the book to help manage optimal care. A glossary of commonly used terms and abbreviations and an easy-to-read chart of common disorders matched with their specific abnormal breath and heart sounds add to the book's utility.

Audio-CD cues

Clinical consultants

How to use this book

ONE Heart sound fundamentals

1 THE HEART AND AUSCULTATION Pretest, Anatomy and physiology, Traditional auscultatory areas, Alternative auscultatory areas, Auscultatory techniques, Enhancement techniques, Posttest
2 HEART SOUND DYNAMICS Pretest, Heart sound origins, Basic heart sounds, Depolarization and repolarization, Documenting heart sounds, Posttest TWO Normal heart sounds
3 THE FIRST HEART SOUND Pretest, Normal S1, Abnormal S1 split, Posttest
4 THE SECOND HEART SOUND Pretest, Normal S2, S2 split sounds, Posttest
5 THE THIRD AND FOURTH HEART SOUNDS Pretest, Ventricular filling sounds, Third heart sound, Fourth heart sound, S3 and S4: Similarities and differences, Posttest THREE Abnormal heart sounds
6 OTHER DIASTOLIC AND SYSTOLIC SOUNDS Pretest, Opening snaps, Systolic ejection sounds, Posttest
7 MURMUR FUNDAMENTALS Pretest, Turbulent blood flow, Characteristics, Posttest
8 SYSTOLIC MURMURS Pretest, Anatomy and physiology, Systolic ejection murmurs, Ventricular outflow obstruction murmurs, Systolic regurgitation murmurs, Ventricular septal defect murmur, Posttest
9 DIASTOLIC MURMURS Pretest, Anatomy and physiology, Aortic regurgitation murmurs, Pulmonic regurgitation murmurs, Other diastolic murmurs, Posttest
10 CONTINUOUS MURMURS Pretest, Two causes, Cervical venous hum murmurs, Patent ductus arteriosus murmurs, Posttest
11 OTHER AUSCULTATORY SOUNDS Pretest, Prosthetic valve sounds and murmurs, Aortic prosthetic valves, Mitral prosthetic valves, Pericardial friction rubs, Mediastinal crunch, Posttest FOUR Breath sound fundamentals
12 THE RESPIRATORY SYSTEM AND AUSCULTATION Pretest, Anatomy and physiology, The mechanics of breathing, Auscultatory areas, Auscultatory techniques, Posttest
13 INTRODUCTION TO BREATH SOUNDS Pretest, Breath sound production, Terminology, Documenting auscultation findings, Posttest FIVE Normal breath sounds
14 BREATH SOUNDS HEARD IN HEALTHY INDIVIDUALS Pretest, Anatomy and physiology, Posttest SIX Abnormal breath sounds
15 BRONCHIAL BREATH SOUNDS Pretest, Sound production, Posttest
16 ABNORMAL VOICE SOUNDS Pretest, Sound production, Posttest
17 ABSENT AND DIMINISHED BREATH SOUNDS Pretest, Sound production, Posttest SEVEN Other abnormal breath sounds
18 CLASSIFYING ADVENTITIOUS SOUNDS Pretest, Confusion over terminology, Current classification system, Posttest
19 ADVENTITIOUS SOUNDS: CRACKLES Pretest, Sound production, Documentation, Late inspiratory crackles,Early inspiratory and expiratory crackles, Pleural crackles, Posttest
20 ADVENTITIOUS SOUNDS: WHEEZES Pretest, Sound production, Expiratory polyphonic wheezes, Fixed monophonic wheezes, Sequential inspiratory wheezes, Random monophonic wheezes, Stridor, Posttest
Auscultation findings for common disorders

Assessment flowcharts for common auscultation findings

English-Spanish phrases used in cardiac and respiratory assessment

Posttest answers

Selected readings

Glossary

Index