Getting Started: The First Post

Hello World :)

... Or at least that portion of the world with tired crusty eyes from being up last night, bruises from teaching a three year old to wrestle, or a chronic, adolescent inspired nervous tic ......

Yep .......... Hello, parents ..............

I work in a children's emergency department in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The thing about emergency pediatrics is this: while it is true that every week (sometimes each day) you see something as a physician that you have never seen before, at the same time most of the patients you see have the same old bread and butter problems ... issues that are new to them (and therefore sometimes pretty distressing) but which are old hat to even the newest clinician.

Most of us have given the croup talk, or the asthma talk so many times that we forget sometimes which parts are the hardest to hear. We may not have time in a busy department to do these topics justice, and many times the parents are too frazzled to remember completely what we say. Result: for a number of reasons, we may not communicate well.

Its a version of the 80/20 rule: most of our cases are caused by a small number of conditions. If we could communicate better about a relatively small number of illnesses, we could improve the care for the majority of our patients.

So that's what this blog is about. This is where I try to write down the information and advice that I would give parents in the ED if I had no time constraints. Check the archives to find a listing of topics I have already discussed; more will be added from my increasingly defunct website as time goes by. Use the Google search bar at the top to look for a condition you are interested in. If you don't find one, post a comment requesting it!

And give me feedback! I don't do well talking to myself. If you disagree with me, you will find that I want to hear your point of view. (I review the posts prior to letting them go up because I want to keep the language and mood positive here, so don't be surprised if it takes a little while to show up). Ideally, this would be a place where discussions amongst parents can be nurtured as well.

That's it! First post. Let me know what you think.

Brett