For the background on this project check out my post The AnkiEM Project. Basically, when I started making cards to review for my board exams I knew that I wanted to use a spaced-repetition flashcard tool (thanks to Chris Nickson‘s from Life in the Fast Lane for exposing me to this concept) and Anki seemed like the best bet. However, as I collected feedback from Eve Purdy, Andrew Tagg, Joshua Power and Reuben Strayer I began to consider other alternatives. Specifically, I agreed with Joshua Power that it would …
Tiny Tips: The Effects of TCAs
This month I’ve been reading a lot of toxicology. While running through the Antidepressant chapter in Rosen’s I realized that I was definitely going to need help remembering the ridiculous number of pharmacological effects of TCAs. Practical? Not so much. A potentially esoteric exam question? Definitely. This is the first BoringEM “Tiny Tip.” While most of my medical posts are quite long, I think there is some merit to occasionally going over something …
The AnkiEM Project
Inspired jointly by Reuben Strayer‘s catalog of EMCards on Emergency Medicine Updates and Chris Nickson‘s post at Life in the Fast Lane on spaced repetition, I will be trialing a combination of these two ideas using Anki flashcard software to create the AnkiEM Project. Dr. Strayer‘s strategy for studying for his board exam was to summarize Rosen’s Emergency Medicine onto flash cards. In the spirit of FOAM, he then scanned all 1412 cards onto his EM Updates site and made them freely available. If you haven’t already checked them out …
Handheld Ultrasound – A Review of the VScan
As it seems to be ultrasound month on BoringEM (see the guest posts from Paul Olszynski here: A Pictorial Approach to Ultrasound in Shock and Chris Byrne here: Point of Care Ultrasound: A Hyperechoic Future in Med Ed), I thought I’d chime in with a review of my new toy. I just completed a four week rotation at a regional ED that is not equipped with an ultrasound unit. Fortunately, my residency program purchased a GE VScan handheld ultrasound machine for …
New authors at BoringEM
BoringEM is excited to announce the addition of two new authors! Please help to welcome them by following them on twitter and distributing their first posts. Joel D’Eath is a Canadian paramedic that has previously been active in the world of FOAM through his twitter account @cmedik and website Post 88. He has committed to compiling the Canadian FOAM of the Week on an ongoing basis and writing some posts on Boring Pre-hospital …
The Agitated Patient in the ED: Moderate & Severe Agitation
In my first post of a trilogy on the agitated patient in the ED I outlined BARS sedation score for defining levels of agitation, discussed how to risk stratify a potentially agitated patient and offered some tips on how to deal with the mildly agitated patient. This post will discuss what to do with moderately and severely agitated patients while the final chapter will delve into the work-up of these challenging patients. If you’ve been …