by Shahbaz Syed | Dec 25, 2025 | Commentary, Featured
Every December, the Emergency Department changes character a little. Lights show up around the nursing station. Someone brings in shortbread that appears to pre-date the Roman Empire. There is Christmas music. Someone inevitably wrongly claims that “Die Hard” is not a...
by Shahbaz Syed | Dec 20, 2025 | Commentary, Featured, Infectious Disease
We’re seeing a major uptick in influenza this season, and Oseltamivir (Tamiflu) continues to be prescribed widely during flu season, particularly during surges when Emergency Departments feel pressure to “do something.” Despite this, a careful examination of the...
by Lucy Karp | Aug 7, 2025 | Commentary, Critical Care, Grand Round Summaries, Resuscitation
While the term ‘God Squad’ reflects a real committee from the 1960s, we use it here critically to examine the risks of unchecked decision-making power in emergency care. This is a photo of the Admissions and Policy Committee of the Seattle Artificial Kidney Centre,...
by Max Zworth | Apr 24, 2025 | Commentary, Featured, Grand Round Summaries, Physician Wellness
In part 1 of this 2-part series on medicolegal risk in Emergency Medicine, we looked at two legal cases, with a primary focus on civil litigation and college complaints. In this section, we focus on risk assessment, documentation, and advice from lawyers and CMPA...
by Shahbaz Syed | Nov 14, 2024 | Commentary, Featured, Toxicology
Urine drug (or toxicologic) screens are a fairly standard tool used in addictions, psychiatry and the Emergency Department (ED), often employed to detect substance use in patients presenting with altered mental status, trauma, psychiatric or abnormal behaviour. Yet,...
by Shahbaz Syed | Oct 24, 2024 | Airway, Anesthesiology, Commentary, Critical Care, Featured, Resuscitation
Precedex (dexmedetomidine) is an alpha-2 adrenergic agonist increasingly used in critical care environments for sedation and anxiolysis. It offers a unique profile of sedation without respiratory depression, making it an attractive option in various clinical...
by James Gilbertson, Paul Pageau | Oct 10, 2024 | Anesthesiology, Commentary, Procedural care, Radiology, Ultrasound
Ever tried injecting local anesthetic into the bottom of someone’s foot? If you have, you’ll understand the incredible pain and difficulty in trying to anesthetize this region. Fortunately, there’s a better way to anesthetize the plantar foot, and avoid getting kicked...
by James Gilbertson, Rajiv Thavanathan | Oct 10, 2024 | Commentary, OBGYN, Radiology, Ultrasound
We often talk about PoCUS for first-trimester bleeding. Is there an IUP? NDIUP? IDK? Yet one of the most common questions patients ask is; “Can you see the heartbeat?” While measuring fetal heart rate is not always our top priority, I’m here to convince you of the...
by Nate Murray, Eusang Ahn | Oct 3, 2024 | Commentary, Featured, Radiology, Ultrasound
Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is often taught to answer binary questions, like, “Is there free fluid in the abdomen?” However, when we combine POCUS images with clinical documentation, we are telling a story — and every good story has a beginning,...
by Eusang Ahn | Sep 26, 2024 | Commentary, Critical Care, Featured, Neurology, pharmacology, Resuscitation
I wrote this piece because understanding diseases by framing them as high or low levels of dopamine, acetylcholine, glutamate, or GABA has significantly improved my grasp of their pathophysiology and treatment strategies. Too often, medicine is taught as isolated...
