A talk that I did on childhood stroke needs editing to remove a potenially identifiable case before i post it. Childhood stroke is not terribly common but terribly devestating when it happens.

If there is one thing to take away from the paediatric strokes i have been involved in caring for is to recognise that it occurs so that these poor kids and families don't have the indignity of being told that the symptoms are not real, just because you didn't realise that kids could get strokes. The sad truth is that there is little that can be done for these patients acutely to change their outcome and most of the benefit we can offer them is in the paediatric neurology and rehab ward so good emergency care is about diagnosis, excluding the small number of cases where you can make an acute difference and making sure that these families feel cared for.

Remember that most of what you learn in med school is wrong a few years later but making people feel properly cared for has been right since Hippocarates.

Ben McKenzie went up to Swan Hill to have a discussion about pain relief in the ED.  It was an excellent opportunity to talk about acute pain but also have an extended meeting to talk about tid bits arising about more general emergency medicine topics from subarrachnoid haemorrhage to burns dressings.

Click Here to download the presentation

Click here for the NHMRC acute pain manual for emergency departments in Australia - Easy to read, engaging and practical!!! - It is an excellent resource!

This week Dr Greg Harris led a discussion on renal medicine.  View the slides here

Dr Janine Arnold surgical fellow took us through acute and chronic limb ischaemia.  View the presentation here

A comprehensive approach to the liver disease patient in the ED by Bendigo ED Registrar Dr Alex Archer

download the presentation here