Practice Question
Which of the following can be assessed with light palpation? [Select all that apply]
Answer Choices:
Correct Answer:
Tenderness
Rationale:
🔹Tenderness
♦️Light palpation helps the nurse detect areas of pain or discomfort by applying gentle pressure over the skin and superficial tissues.
♦️Clients may react with verbal or nonverbal cues (grimacing, guarding, or withdrawing) if tenderness is present.
♦️Assessing tenderness guides the nurse to avoid causing further pain and to focus deeper assessment where needed.
♦️It is commonly checked during abdominal, musculoskeletal, or soft tissue exams.
🔹Skin texture
♦️Light palpation allows the nurse to feel for temperature, moisture, smoothness, roughness, or dryness of the skin.
♦️Texture changes can indicate conditions such as dehydration, edema, hypothyroidism (dry, coarse skin), or liver disease (smooth skin).
♦️Palpating with the finger pads provides the best sensitivity to surface changes.
♦️This is part of routine head-to-toe assessment.
🔹Masses
♦️Superficial lumps, nodules, or swelling close to the skin surface can be detected with light palpation.
♦️Examples include enlarged lymph nodes, lipomas, or cysts.
♦️While deeper organs and large internal tumors require deep palpation, light palpation is sufficient to identify superficial masses.
♦️This provides early clues for further diagnostic evaluation.
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This question is from Final Exam A1 FA25 which contains 50 questions.
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Question Details
- Category: RN Nursing Exam(s)
- Subcategory: Examplify Exam(s)
- Domain: Health Assessment
- Answer Choices: 5