resuscitation and critical care medicine
In this CritCases blog - a collaboration between STARS Air Ambulance Service, Mike Betzner and EM Cases, we take you through a not uncommon stroke presentation which then develops into a challenge with regard to management of elevated ICP, hypertension and the airway...
In this EM Cases podcast Dr. Joel Lockwood tells his Best Case Ever of a prehospital trauma resuscitation, bringing to light the challenges faced by EMS with the complicated trauma patient. He discusses the importance of checklists, practice and simulation to help streamline the process, offloading some cognitive burden, prepare the team, reduce the change of errors, improve efficiency and etch actions into each team member's muscle memory.
This is the first ever video podcast on EM Cases with Jordan Chenkin from EMU Conference 2017 discussing how to optimize three aspects of cardiac arrest care: persistent ventricular fibrillation, optimizing pulse checks and PEA arrest, with code team videos contrasting the ACLS approach to an optimized approach...
Management of the pediatric trauma patient is challenging regardless of where you work. In this EM Cases episode, with the help of two leading pediatric trauma experts, Dr. Sue Beno from Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto and Dr. Faud Alnaji from Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario in Ottawa we answer such questions as: what are the most important physiologic and anatomic differences between children and adults that are key to managing the trauma patient? How much fluid should be given prior to blood products? What is the role of POCUS in abdominal trauma? Which patients require abdominal CT? How do you clear the pediatric c-spine? Are atropine and fentanyl recommended as pre-induction agents in the pediatric trauma patient? How can the BIG score help us prognosticate? Is tranexamic acid recommended in early pediatric trauma like it is in adults? Is the Pediatric Trauma Score helpful in deciding which patients should be transferred to a trauma center? and many more...
Airway management requires a lot things; it requires not only technical skills and specific considerations of anatomy and physiology but a co-ordinated team who can communicate clearly and react to a whole slew of potentially challenging situations. On this month's Best Case Ever podcast we use the framework of a new mnemonic PREPARE to discuss human factors, situational awareness and some airway tips and tricks with intensivist Peter Brindley, human factors expert Chris Hicks and EM-intensivist Sara Gray...
In this CritCases blog - a collaboration between STARS Air Ambulance Service, Mike Betzner and EM Cases we discuss a challenging case of pulmonary hypertension where a fine balance in volume resuscitation, oxygenation and ventilation is critical.
I remember when I started practicing emergency medicine a decade and a half ago it seemed that any kid who came to our ED in cardiac arrest died. I know, depressing thought. But, over the past 15 years, survival to discharge from pediatric cardiac arrest has markedly improved, at least for in-hospital arrests. This is probably mostly due to an emphasis on high-quality CPR and advances in post-resuscitation care; nonetheless the more comfortable, knowledgeable and prepared we are for the always scary critically ill pediatric patient, the more likely we will be able to resuscitate them successfully - which is always a huge save.
In this EM Cases CritCases blog - a collaboration with STARS Air Ambulance Service, Mike Betzner, we present a challenging airway obstruction case, the limitations of non-rebreather masks, using PEEP on bag-valve-masks, heliox, tips on awake intubation, and the differential for high peak inspiratory pressures in the post intubation period. With commentary by Michael Betzner and Reuben Strayer as well as expert peer review by George Kovacs...
As EM Cases has grown and expanded over the past 7 years I've had the pleasure of working with a team of talented people. This Best Case Ever was produced by two all-star EM residents from Ottawa, podcaster Dr. Rajiv Vairavanathan and editor Dr. Richard Hoang. In this all-resident Best Case Ever we interview Dr. Chris Belcher from University of Kentucky about TTP - Thrombotic Thrombocytopenic Purpura, that rare but often elusive clotting disorder that picks off multiple organs and has a near 100% mortality rate without treatment...
In anticipation of EM Cases Episode 90 on the Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) guidelines with the lead author Dr. Allan DeCaen and Dr. Anthony Crocco, Dr. DeCaen tells his Best Case Ever showing us the value of orchestrated team work and a great example of the saying, "they're not dead until they're warm and dead"...