Does Ibuprofen protect against Acute Mountain Sickness?
The issue of prevention of Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS) has been debated extensively on the high altitude walking tracks around the world and also in the literature
Yet Another Six SMACCers!
PK SMACC-talks are turning into the FOAM equivalent of the Ginsu steak knife — there’s always more! First up, Colin Parker (@empemorg) of the original paediatric emergency medicine podcast empem.org — and one of my buddies and teachers from back…
SMACC after SMACC after SMACC
Although SMACC is less than a month away now, we're loving the PKs so much that we're leaving the door open for more submissions until the latest possible moment
SMACC FOAM Q/A
Joe Lex, Scott Weingart, Simon Carley, Minh Le Cong, Oli Flower, Mike Cadogan and Chris Nickson talk with the SMACC audience about FOAM... for nearly 2 hours!!!
Overdiagnosis
The latest buzz word in the medical blogosphere is ‘overdiagnosis‘. This iatrogenic neologism is increasingly being seen as a significant threat to human health. Overdiagnosis is the diagnosis of “disease” that will never cause symptoms or death during a patient’s lifetime.…
Emergency marketing in just 4 hours
Selling patients is sad reality of life as an emergency doctor, will things be worse when the four hour rule is adopted Australia wide?
A Ward Round with the Professor of Surgery
The registrars, house staff and the medical students waited in line. Each had an eye on the clock above the nurse’s station. In one minute it would be 6.30 pm. Right on cue, the double doors to the ward swung…
Chocolate saves lives
A recent study in the European Heart Journal gives us a new reason to enjoy some of life's little pleasures. German researchers followed almost 20,000 participants (as part of a larger cancer epidemiology study) over 10 years and had them document their chocolate intake.
The Baloney Detection Kit
Not sure what to believe? Start using your Baloney Detection Kit. The idea of a ‘Baloney Detection Kit‘ originates with the late Carl Sagan, as detailed in his classic book ‘The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the…
The Only Home We’ve Ever Known
Sometimes in the hustle and bustle of everyday life we can lose a sense of perspective. It is easy to get bound up in our own little universe and become filled with self-importance.
Dundrum Quay (posted in tribute to Seamus Heaney)
Barnacle encrusted stumps remain.Thrusting, vertebral fossils From tidal glar pools and rising silt. The bar is no longer dredged: Time gently smudges over noisy, dark, Dangerous memories: Coal-black, Bent-backed, Hard men stooping – Their iron shovels grate on coal, Organic…
Health care – do we (and HOW do we) really CARE?
This is a re-post of a rant I let slip on a colleague’s FB page – he had just published an article in the local rag (The Mercury) with some great points about future directions in health care provision. His…