EM Physicians Dominate Romance Novels

From Yahoo News
If romantic fiction is any guide, any doctor looking for love would be advised to be an emergency room surgeon or deliver babies rather than practise colon resection or remove in-grown toenails.
Hospital novels are one of the fastest-growing areas of romantic fiction which, according to the Romance Writers of America, generates 1.2 [...]

Pain Scale Absurdity

From Scalpel or Sword:
Two patients came into the ER by ambulance complaining of pain.
One was a young woman with another migraine, who “usually gets” Dilaudid 4-6 mg IV in addition to IV Reglan and Ativan. She was allergic to many other medications, but she had a full bottle of dilaudid 8 mg pills and some [...]

Visble Body Website

The Argosy Visible Body, which promises to be a free virtual anatomy website, is looking like a rather impressive product already. Videos of the development, provided by the company, show a simple interface and an easy method to get to individual anatomic parts of the body. Here are the features the website will provide:
Search for [...]

"25 Skills Every Doctor Should Possess"

From the Cheerful Oncologist, excerpted below:
Skills all doctors should possess:
1. Recognize when a patient needs to be transferred to the ICU.
2. Deliver bad news compassionately, yet honestly.
3. Identify a pneumothorax on a chest radiograph.
4. Diagnose iron deficiency anemia.
5. Help a patient stop smoking cigarettes.
6. Diagnose thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura, which has a mortality rate of 90% [...]

ACEP on CA-MRSA

From the American College of Emergency Physicians
Washington, D.C. — The spread of a potentially life-threatening antibiotic-resistant staph germ that is responsible for more deaths in the United States each year than the AIDS virus has prompted the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) to launch an education initiative aimed at protecting the public against the [...]

Air Medical Controversy in Texas

From JEMS
EMS Units Bypassed Nearest Helicopters: Physician Says Ties to a Firm Don’t Influence Agencies’ Decisions
What happened to Bridges that night was part of a pattern repeated more than two dozen times in the last two years in the area: EMS crews did not call the closest helicopter ambulance service.
In each incident, the EMS [...]

Defensive Medicine (ED Example) on CBS

From CBS.com
CBS) It started as a simple stomach ache, but Alexandra Varipapa, a sophomore at the University of Richmond, decided to go to the emergency room.
There, doctors ordered a full CT scan, a radiation imaging test, which found a harmless ovarian cyst. She never questioned the CT scan, CBS News correspondent Wyatt Andrews reports. [...]

CMS Sets Requirement for Hospitals Without 24/7 Physician Coverage

From the Iowa Hospital Association
IHA has received several questions from hospitals regarding a new Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) requirement aimed at patient safety and emergency services. The requirement, effective October 1, mandates that all hospitals, including inpatient acute (whether Prospective Payment System or exempt), Critical Access Hospitals, long-term care, psychiatric, rehabilitation, children’s [...]

California ED data

This week’s San Diego Union Tribune features a story of one doctor’s attempt to encourage hospitals to come clean with ED wait-time figures as a step toward improving traffic flow. Dr. Roneet Lev, an emergency physician at Scripps Mercy in Hillcrest, leads the Emergency Medicine Oversight Commission of the San Diego County Medical Society. She recently [...]

Firefighters, police push for city’s help treating drug-resistant infection.

From the Fresno Bee
The Fresno City Council agreed Tuesday that a drug-resistant staph infection afflicting some city firefighters should be considered a work-related injury for firefighters and police officers.
Some firefighters are upset they’re forced to pay health insurance co-payments and use their sick time to recover from the infections they believe they contracted at work.
If [...]