General survey, vitals, hands, head & neck

Before any system-specific routine, every bedside case opens with the same groundwork: the end-of-the-bed survey, a full set of vital signs, and the peripheral stigmata you read off the hands, skin and neck. This page is the shared "front end" of the cardiac, respiratory and abdominal exams — get it slick here and you save minutes (and catch diagnoses) in every later station.