SkillsLib.ai

Emergency Differential Diagnosis & Risk Stratification

Structure emergency differentials by acuity risk and flag life-threatening diagnoses

4.3(26 reviews)
100+ downloads
Updated Oct 2026
Verified SafeSecurity VerifiedThis skill was analyzed by our AI security scanner for harmful content including data exfiltration, system manipulation, credential theft, and prompt injection. No threats were detected.

What You Can Do

You can input a complex, multi-system emergency presentation—chief complaint, vital signs, and key clinical findings—and Claude organizes the differential diagnosis by acuity risk rather than alphabetical order. The skill prioritizes must-not-miss diagnoses, flags life-threatening conditions, anchors clinical reasoning to prevent cognitive biases, and suggests immediate diagnostic workup and disposition considerations tailored to each diagnosis tier.

Features

Acuity-stratified differential organization

rank diagnoses by risk level (red-flag emergencies, high-risk, moderate, lower-acuity) rather than alphabetical order

Must-not-miss condition flagging

highlight low-frequency high-consequence diagnoses (PE in dyspnea, ACS in syncope, meningitis in headache)

Anchoring bias prevention

structure reasoning to counter pattern-recognition shortcuts and fatigue-driven cognitive errors

Organ-system-agnostic synthesis

handle multi-system presentations that span cardiopulmonary, neuro, GI, metabolic, and trauma etiologies

Immediate workup guidance

suggest first-line diagnostics (labs, imaging, bedside testing) paired to each diagnosis tier

Disposition decision support

recommend ICU vs. floor admission, observation criteria, and safe discharge considerations

High-volume shift optimization

reduce mental-load cognitive work during night shifts, surge periods, and trainee-led evaluations

Example Output

Input: 67-year-old male, chief complaint dyspnea × 2 hours, O₂ sat 88% on RA, HR 112, BP 145/92, RRR 24. Recent hip surgery 3 days ago. Unilateral leg swelling, clear lungs. PMHx: HTN, CAD s/p stent 2020.

Output:

🔴 RED-FLAG EMERGENCIES (Must not miss):

  • Pulmonary embolism — Recent immobility (post-op hip), unilateral leg swelling, hypoxia, tachycardia
  • Acute coronary syndrome — Age, CAD history, dyspnea as anginal equivalent
  • Pneumonia/sepsis — Tachypnea, hypoxia (though clear lungs argues against)

🟠 HIGH-RISK (Requires urgent evaluation):

  • Acute heart failure — HTN, dyspnea, hypoxia; but clear lungs and no orthopnea noted
  • DVT with hemodynamic impact — Leg swelling + dyspnea suggests PE risk

🟡 MODERATE RISK:

  • Acute exacerbation COPD — Dyspnea, tachypnea; but no smoking hx/cough documented

Immediate Workup: ECG (stat), troponin, CBC, CMP, lactate, CXR, unilateral LE ultrasound (DVT protocol), consider CT PE protocol if LE U/S positive or high clinical suspicion. Disposition: ICU admission if ECG/troponin abnormal or oxygenation worsens; otherwise high-dependency unit pending PE imaging.

What's Included

  • SKILL.md: instruction file with clinical framework, when-to-use guidance, and prompt templates
  • Presentation template: structured intake checklist (vitals, systems review, PMHx, meds, timeline)
  • Risk-stratification framework: tiered diagnostic organization (red-flag, high-risk, moderate, lower-acuity)
  • Workup decision tree: paired diagnostics and disposition logic by diagnosis tier
  • Teachable case examples: 3–4 multi-system presentations with worked differentials for training and QI review

Who It's For

  • Emergency Medicine Physician Assistants — rapid differential structuring during high-volume shifts and ambiguous presentations
  • Emergency Medicine residents and fellows — verify differential completeness and anchor clinical reasoning in complex cases
  • Urgent care providers — manage multi-system presentations with limited diagnostic bandwidth
  • ED nurses and mid-level practitioners — validate triage reasoning and flag must-not-miss diagnoses
  • Medical education programs — structured case review and quality improvement teaching

Best For

  • Multi-system emergency presentations (chest pain + dyspnea + altered mental status)
  • Low-frequency high-consequence diagnosis recognition (PE, ACS, meningitis in atypical presentations)
  • High-volume night shifts and fatigue-driven cognitive load reduction
  • Trainee-led cases requiring differential completeness verification
  • Post-encounter teaching cases and quality improvement/peer review

You might also like

Perioperative Pain Management Protocol Builder
$35
Pain4.1(35)
Perioperative Pain Management Protocol Builder

You can create comprehensive, evidence-based perioperative pain management protocols tailored to individual patient characteristics and surgical requirements. The skill assesses patient risk factors, recommends optimized multimodal analgesia regimens with specific drug selections and dosing rationales, incorporates regional techniques when appropriate, and identifies contingency plans for inadequate pain control or contraindications. This enables you to move beyond generic guidelines toward truly personalized pain management strategies that reduce opioid exposure while maintaining analgesia.

Surgical Case Planning Assistant for Oral Surgery
$35
Surgical Case Planning Assistant for Oral Surgery

You can systematically analyze complex oral surgical cases by generating comprehensive pre-operative plans that consider osseous anatomy, neurovascular structures, and patient-specific risk factors. Claude structures multifactorial surgical analysis into actionable operative protocols, risk stratification reports, and detailed procedural workflows that reduce surgical time and improve clinical outcomes while providing medical-legal documentation.

Sports Injury Assessment & Documentation Protocol
$40
Sports4.0(33)
Sports Injury Assessment & Documentation Protocol

Conduct comprehensive sports injury assessments using standardized orthopedic tests, mechanism-of-injury analysis, and functional capacity evaluation. You'll document findings in insurance-compliant formats, identify red flags requiring referral, establish objective baseline measurements for progress tracking, and generate evidence-based return-to-play recommendations with clear functional milestones.

Psychiatric Case Formulation Assistant
$50
Psychiatry3.8(21)
Psychiatric Case Formulation Assistant

This skill guides you through structured psychiatric case formulation using a biopsychosocial framework. You input patient presentation, assessment data, and clinical history, then receive a comprehensive formulation that integrates symptom synthesis, differential diagnosis reasoning, predisposing/precipitating/perpetuating factors, protective factors, and evidence-based treatment recommendations. The output is suitable for clinical documentation, insurance authorizations, case conferences, and supervision.

Surgical Preoperative Risk Assessment & Optimization
$40
Surgery3.6(25)
Surgical Preoperative Risk Assessment & Optimization

You can rapidly synthesize complex patient data—comorbidities, functional status, labs, medications—into a comprehensive risk profile and actionable optimization plan. This skill guides you through ASA classification, procedure-specific risk stratification, and patient-centered consent documentation to ensure thorough clinical reasoning and defensible preoperative assessment.

Differential Diagnosis Framework for Nurse Practitioners
$40
Differential Diagnosis Framework for Nurse Practitioners

You'll develop comprehensive, hierarchical differential diagnoses that integrate clinical reasoning principles with patient safety. This framework helps you identify 'can't-miss' diagnoses, challenge diagnostic assumptions, and sequence diagnostic workup logically—whether managing complex presentations, atypical symptoms, or high-stakes clinical decisions in primary care, urgent care, or specialty settings.

Occupational Therapy Functional Assessment Report Generator
$45
Occupational Therapy Functional Assessment Report Generator

You can convert clinical observation notes, standardized assessment results (FIM, COPM, AMPAC, etc.), and patient history into professionally formatted occupational therapy functional assessment reports. The skill synthesizes raw data into cohesive narratives that document baseline function, identify specific functional limitations, justify interventions to insurance companies, and establish measurable treatment goals—reducing hours of manual documentation while ensuring compliance with insurance requirements and clinical standards.

OT Treatment Planning Synthesizer
$35
OT Treatment Planning Synthesizer

This skill transforms fragmented OT assessment findings—ROM measurements, strength tests, ADL observations—into cohesive clinical narratives that connect impairment to functional limitation to participation restriction. You'll generate SMART goals that satisfy both clinical rigor and insurance reimbursement standards, and build intervention plans with explicit evidence-based rationale that accelerates authorization and justifies medical necessity to payers.

$25.00