For the past few decades, the importance of spinal immobilisation has been emphasised in standard texts, trauma education such as the international Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS) & Pre-Hospital Trauma Life Support (PHTLS) courses and in many emergency medical service (EMS) operating procedures. Such approaches often mandate the universal application of spinal immobilisation to trauma […]
A Practical Approach to C Spines? Read More »
Every now and then, discussion amongst clinicians turns to the hypothetical of “what if you were stranded on a desert island?” and then leads into fierce debate on emergency drugs, preferred contents of a doctors bag or various airway devices. Of course all of this is hypothetical – not many of us are going to be stranded,
Desert Island Airways Read More »
Readers of the blog will know that I spent the second half of the year with MedSTAR, South Australia’s retrieval service and part of SA Ambulance Service (SAAS). As a rural doctor I am usually a user of this service. It’s taken a few years after being invited to coordinate time off to arrange time out of practice
All About That (MedSTAR) Base Read More »
The concept of a “GP anaesthetist” or “GP obstetrician” can be a vexed one. Colleagues with the appropriate specialist ticket (FANZCA & FRANZCOG respectively in Australia) may question why the heck a general practitioner is meddling in their arena of expertise. We may hear similar from FACEMs in regard to emergency care. I have no doubt
GP Anaesthesia 2020 & Beyond Read More »
If you’ve been following blogs such as THE PHARM recently, you’ll probably have seen reference to a chap called Minh le Cong and a drug called ketamine. Now it’s no secret that many in the prehospital and emergency fields are fond of ketamine – it’s a useful dissociative agent with analgesic properties and can be