The Q Word Podcast

Lisa and Nyssa tackle one of the biggest taboos in emergency medicine: laughter in the ER. Why it happens, is it appropriate, and if it is, when is it appropriate?

Nyssa and Lisa talk about customs and concepts that pervade the ER which should be re-examined. Learn why "He/she is a good nurse, but...", "Everybody [or nobody] does it that way," and "No one will ever know" are little lies every nurse should watch out for in their practice.

In the second half of this special episode, Britanny Smith shares her carefully cultivated "Toolkit" with The Q Word Podcast audience, explaining to Lisa and Nyssa how to assemble one to use in your practice when facing the complex interactions required when dealing with the neurodivergent population. This document (link on website) contains a comprehensive but concise list of Do's and Do Not's, as well as links to where you can investigate what simple items can be relied upon to help you and your patient communicate.

The four part Special Populations in Trauma series is sponsored by the Georgia Region V Regional Trauma Advisory Committee (RTAC). Each EMS region establishes an RTAC to monitor the trauma system in their area from the prevalence, prevention, improvement, education, and compliance angles. The Region V RTAC planned educational trauma outreach to include classes and conferences for the quarter, but Covid-19 made it unsafe to carry out those plans in person. The regional leadership got creative and approached Lisa and Nyssa about using The Q Word Podcast platform to publish trauma education in a pandemic safe way both to their region and to others. We appreciate being included in this endeavor.

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The four episodes cover the deviations and additions to the usual primary and secondary trauma surveys in the special populations of the pregnant trauma patient, the pediatric trauma patient, the bariatric trauma patient, and the geriatric trauma patient. We discuss the epidemiology, the assessments and interventions, special considerations including ethical issues, and end of life concerns in each population.

In the critically ill trauma patient, optimizing airway, breathing, and circulation is not always as easy as the ABCs. In this episode, Nyssa and Lisa discuss resuscitative sequence intubation and how it differs from a crash intubation or a delayed sequence intubation. We also consider how to handle the special cases of TBI patients and the combative trauma patient.