A 30-year-old female with no significant past medical history is brought to the trauma unit after a motorcycle accident.

A 30-year-old female with no significant past medical history is brought to the trauma unit after a motorcycle accident. Upon physical assessment, the nurse notes respiratory distress and paradoxical movements of the thorax. The patient has multiple bruises on her right chest, pulse oximeter reading is 87% and the patient is tachypneic with a RR of 32 bpm. When auscultating the patient’s lungs, the nurse finds clear lung sounds in the left hemithorax, but absent lung sounds on the right lung base with diminished sounds in the right upper lung area. Based on this information, the nurse suspects this patient may need to be treated for: Post-traumatic chylothorax due to compression of intrathoracic lung lymphatics. Impending right-sided pneumonitis after massive chest trauma. Pulmonary embolism of the right lung due to severe intrathoracic hemorrhage. Right-sided pneumothorax secondary to multiple rib fractures as evidenced by signs of flail chest.