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  • Blog

Responding to Complaints

Answering complaints is an important role of the ED Consultant and it’s now part of the RCEM management portfolio. We’ve made a few suggestions about how to answer complaints but everyone will have their own tips, so feel free to leave a comment or two.
  • Blog

Bullying in the Emergency Department

Bullying is something that an unacceptably high number of healthcare workers will experience. Despite priding itself in being a friendly specialty with a flattened hierarchy, those working in emergency medicine, too, report experiencing bullying.
  • SAQ

The sick reattender…and they were in your department 3 days ago

You have just been informed that there is a patient in Resus who has a subdural haematoma.
  • Blog

Confidentiality, Capacity and Consent in PEM

It’s Friday evening and you’re at work in the ED (where else would you rather be??). Jack is a 15-year-old boy who has taken an overdose of paracetamol a couple of hours ago. He texted his girlfriend soon after and she called an ambulance.
  • SAQ

Managing a serious incident

It is Monday morning 09.00hrs and you are checking your email inbox. You have received the following email from the StR who has just finished weekend nights.
  • Blog

Charity Starts at Home – How to Motivate and Care for Yourself and Your Staff

Type A personality, adrenaline junkie, calm in a crisis yet high performer under pressure, adept at multitasking, an ability to stay awake 24/7, survives on a diet of red bull and coffee. Does this sound like you?
  • SBA

Complaints

Complaints are unfortunately common – but how do you reply to them?
  • Blog

Supporting Overseas Doctors (IMGs)

There are many components of looking after overseas doctors. Many of them are intuitive and seem common sense, but our experience suggests the basics are often done poorly. We define an overseas doctors as a doctor who has trained, and probably worked, abroad who is embarking on a new healthcare career in the NHS.
  • SBA

Supporting Overseas Doctors

Are you supporting your overseas team as much as you could? Inspired by the RCEMLearning blog, here are some questions.
  • Blog

Emergency Casebook 3: Cauda Costs

This is the third in a series of Emergency Casebooks from the virtual hospital CFN General, with key learning points for staff working in an Emergency Department
  • Blog

Combatting the Crowd

This blog will serve to explore what we can do, within ED, to help ensure good patient flow, reduce overcrowding and improve patient experience.
  • Blog

Health Inequalities in the ED

Inequalities in health are nothing new... Whilst many things have improved with time, the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown some of the most stark differences in to light.
  • Blog

The Importance of Debrief

This was originally published as part of the medical student iBook. We’ve reproduced it here with some additions as we think it’s great, and as much as this is written from a medical student perspective, it could be a new FY2 or a new nurse - or an old hand. 
  • Clinical Case

Coprophagy in Humans

A 45-year-old man develops methemoglobinemia after an incidence of eating his own faeces.
  • Blog

Diagnosing Death

We’ve talked a lot in RCEMLearning blogs about how to recognise death in ED and how to break bad news, but we haven’t really focused on how to legally “declare” someone as dead, and complete the relevant paperwork. It is through researching updates to my trust’s policy, together with making sure our international medical graduates were aware of the UK rules, that this blog post was born.
  • Blog

Risk and Safety – Part 2

What do we do if we are made aware of an incident? How do we investigate a serious incident and write a report? How do we share the learning?
  • SBA

A Crush Injury

A delayed presentation after trauma with an increasing joint swelling, what gives?
  • Blog

Risk and Safety

We’ve written this blog to emphasise some of the key points around risk, highlight some common terminology, and point out some common misunderstandings.
  • Blog

Vulnerable Migrants

In this article I use the word "vulnerable" to imply an individual at risk for an enhanced need of special care, support, or protection because of age, disability, or risk of abuse or neglect.
  • SBA

A Crowding Challenge

Your department is crowded with multiple ambulances arriving, very few empty clinical spaces and multiple boarded patients due to exit block.
  • Blog

Getting into the Flow:
Operational Efficiency in ED

Improved flow is the current golden bullet, the saviour of ED, in the NHS - the key to unlocking the issues with the health service in its current state of crisis. But how is flow achieved?
  • Blog

Future-Proofing PEM

Where does PEM fit in with EM? Children make up about 25-30% of attendances to mixed EDs nationally, so all EM consultants must possess at least basic paediatric skills.
  • Blog

RCEM ASC 2022

Recap of the ASC 2022 conference
  • SBA

Organ Donation & Changes in the Law

Preparing for exams and trying to find an SBA on organ donation? The law around organ donation has changed; refresh your knowledge with this SBA.

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