My friend ScrubOne suggests that my next post will be on this. Who am I to argue with such wisdom? A deluge of abusive drunks is straining Wellington Hospital’s emergency department, clogging its systems and demoralising staff to such an extent that at least one doctor is considering leaving her job. Nurses say they dread [...]
The editorial in the Weekend Herald today is one of the more insightful commentaries on medicine I have seen. The Editor correctly points out that many of the percieved failings of the medical fraternity have little to do with the facilities, number of staff or quality of clinical acumen. In today’s paper, members of the [...]
Dear Mr. Ryall I hear you are occasionally dropping in to emergency departments unannounced and talking to patients. This is excellent news. Under no circumstances should you continue to sound defensive about this in any way. After all, exactly who is the hospital service for, if not the patients accessing it? How can it be [...]
The news that Timaru Emergency Department is “turning away” patients (actually, sending them to their GPs) is exciting Labour’s health spokesperson, the barely noticeable Ruth Dyson. Labour MP and health spokesperson Ruth Dyson believes essential frontline health services are being cut. “You can’t get much more frontline than the emergency department. The Government promised there [...]
A recent high quality study in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that the use of intravenous drugs in out-of-hospital resuscitation does not lead to better survival rates – just more admissions to hospital. This is a significant finding for two reasons. First, it emphasises that good quality CPR and early access to [...]
The HoS reports that Waitakere Hospital’s emergency department closes its doors after 6.30 at night and emergencies are redirected to the Whitecross A&M or to North Shore Hospital, 25 minutes drive away. Actually, this is not news at all. Waitakere hospital has been doing this for nearly a year. The only thing that has changed [...]
One of the signs of shock in a patient is cold peripheries – cold arms and legs due to lack of blood in them. The circulation always goes first at the outer edges. Once again the small peripheral hospital, Waitakere, is having to close off some services because it cannot fully staff them. Previously, it [...]
Cactus Kate has a long tale of woe about her encounters with our private healthcare system. There is, of course, no incentive for A&M clinics ((Accident and Medical Practices) to improve as their only real competition is Emergency Departments. It is possible for larger doctor’s practices to add an A&M to their facilities, but, so far, few have [...]
A senior ED doctor was beaten up in the Waikato hospital emergency department on Saturday. Being an emergency doctor, I deeply sympathize with my colleague. You are just trying to do your job and care for people and some moron starts throwing his weight around and lashes out at you. You start to develop some [...]
When does your ambulance journey end? Is it when the ambulance arrives at the emergency department, or when you are finally allowed to decant the patient into an ED bed? Clearly, the practice of keeping patients in an ambulance until a bed is available, suggests that ED personnel think it is the latter. A new [...]
