where to begin?

[malia]

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Hi there,
I've recently started lurking on this forum and this is my first post. I'm a 3rd year medical student and will be doing my first ER rotation in about 8 months. Are there any books or resources that I can look over before I get to the ER for things like common procedures, common cases, protocols, even commonly used supplies? I don't want to walk in and stare blankly at the Attending when he asks me to help out with a central line.

Thanks for any advice!

 

[Hard24Get]

welcome! I am a fellow med student applying in EM this year. Here are some links that might be of interest:

Here is a recent SDN article with many helpful hints, including approach to the pt and textbook recs:
http://www.studentdoctor.net/blog/2007/11/21/clinical-clerkship-clues-emergency-medicine/

And a great pdf from Gus Garmel on getting the most out of the clerkship:
www.saem.org/meetings/03handouts/garmel.pdf

Society of Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM) makes a med student guide: http://www.saem.org/saemdnn/Home/Communities/MedicalStudents/EMApplicants/tabid/219/Default.aspx

Emergency Medicine Resident's Association (EMRA) also gives you a nice med student guide with membership

I personally found Pocket Emergency Medicine (has procedures, protocols, common cases, etc), baby Tintinalli's (Emergency Medicine Manual), and Blueprints emergency medicine clinical cases to be the most useful references (the manual for later on). If you are in the beginning of rotations, one of the attendings on this site wrote Pimp Protector, which has helpful stuff for all clerkships, including EM.

The only procedure you may be asked to do right away is suturing, which you can practice on pigs feet and then watch a time or two first if you've never done it before.

Also, check out the forum's FAQs, and feel free to come hang in the "Rearview Mirror" threads and ask or say random things like we do 🙂.

 

[tkim]

http://apps.med.buffalo.edu/procedures/index.asp

 

[mar8d]

I agree with the above posters...definitely check out those websites.

Here's my quick and dirty advice -

The ER Intern's Pocket Survival Guide - not necessarily complete, but it's kind of like an ACLS style guide to common presentations in the ED...consider it a jump off point or "the basics" for common presentations. Another great book is Tarascon Adult Emergency Pocketbook. It has great references and has evidence based guidelines for management and diagnosis. (I'm pretty sure there's a Peds version too, although I didn't have that one.) All are small, lightweight and easy to carry in your scrub pockets without weighing you down.

Essential equipment -
Pen light
Trauma shears
Stethescope (of course!!)

You'll probably figure this out when you start working in the ED, but try to figure out early on where this equipment is...
Tape and Koban
Suture kits
Ultrasound machines
Tonopen or other tonometers
Slit lamp and other ophtho stuff (topical anesthetics, flourescein stain, woods lamp)
Splinting materials
Various kits (Chest tube trays, suction tubing, a-line and central line kits...even if your institution doesn't let you do these procedures as an MSIII or MSIV, it's a huge help to know where this stuff is if something happens to the equipment while your resident is in the middle of performing one of these procedures and needs another kit.)

 

[malia]

thanks everyone for the quick replies! I will definitely start my collection. As a general question to all of you here (you obviously WANT to do Emed) but how do you KNOW for sure you want to do it? As a 3rd year I'm planning out my 4th year rotations and it would be a disaster if I get through a few ED rotations and then realize its really not the right thing for me. I realize the best thing now is do my own research and talk to people in the field. Ahhhh! I think I'm just stressing out....

thanks again!

 

[Hard24Get]

thanks everyone for the quick replies! I will definitely start my collection. As a general question to all of you here (you obviously WANT to do Emed) but how do you KNOW for sure you want to do it? As a 3rd year I'm planning out my 4th year rotations and it would be a disaster if I get through a few ED rotations and then realize its really not the right thing for me. I realize the best thing now is do my own research and talk to people in the field. Ahhhh! I think I'm just stressing out....

thanks again!

Definitely check out the FAQs for personality features that suggest compatibility. I would agree with most of it, except I still kind of think of medicine as a calling 😳. If you don't multi-task on a regular basis and dream of being someone's "doc for life", you are likely to go the way of my classmates who backed out after doing a few rotations.

But in terms of KNOWing, I felt I didn't KNOW until my 2nd EM sub-I, because it showed me that I love practicing EM and that it is environment-independent. Of course, people could argue you won't really KNOW except in retrospect as a soon-to-be-retiring EP....