You are attending a departmental event when you walk over to a group of your colleagues, and the conversation goes silent. You wonder if you had that effect on the conversation, but the awkward silence is reluctantly broken by the person who was speaking when they quietly continue their story. This veteran physician discusses a recent incident where they placed a wrong-sized lumen chest tube in a patient, only to have to replace …
HiQuiPs: Patient Safety in the ED Part 2 – Key Concepts in the Systems-Based Patient Safety Paradigm
You are working a busy shift in your local ED, which has a paper-based system for documentation and orders. You have seen two patients with the first name ‘Ben’, and two patients with the last name ‘Chen’. As you are reflecting on this, you realize that the last order you placed for one of the ‘Bens’ was placed on the wrong patient chart. You quickly grab the chart, put a line through the …
CAEP FEI | The Global Health Emergency Medicine Organization
Natasha is a third year Emergency Medicine resident who has a passion for travel and tropical diseases. She has heard of other recent graduates of her training program pursuing additional training in global health. She has always felt drawn to a career in global health but is overwhelmed by the options available online. She wishes there was an organization at her institution that can help her navigate the process. This Feature Educational Innovation …
HiQuiPs: Patient Safety in the ED Part 1 – Introduction to the Systems Approach
So far in our series we’ve explored several approaches, frameworks and tools that will help guide you through the process of quality improvement. You are probably eager to get started at this point (or you may have already!), but you may be wondering which areas to target first in your emergency department (ED). In a previous post we listed some high-yield priorities to choose from. Among these, one of the most recognized and accessible …
HiQuiPs: Implementation Part 2 – Which Strategy to Choose: PDSA, Lean, or Six Sigma?
PDSA, Lean, and Six Sigma are three different frameworks that can be part of your quality improvement armamentarium. Each of them can often be applied to the same quality issue. Deciding on which one to use requires an understanding of their inherent strengths and weaknesses. In our last post, we briefly introduced the theory behind Lean, Six Sigma, and PDSA cycles. Here, we will practically apply each methodology to one quality problem to …
Steps to Success in Enhanced Training in Emergency Medicine: The CCFP-EM Year
This post is the first of a series of opinion pieces dedicated to resident physicians and medical students applying, experiencing, and studying for the Canadian College of Family Medicine – Enhanced Training in Emergency Medicine (CCFP-EM) year. Be sure to also listen to the companion podcast: Are you a Family Medicine resident about to graduate and embark on an extra year of training in Emergency Medicine (EM)? Are you worried you don’t know …