Checklists in EMS

[WolfmanHarris]

I found this article while reading the news today. Once again I feel like EMS could learn a few things in terms from the aviation industry.

CBC News Article

NEJM Abstract

There's a pre-hospital researcher up here that I read an article about, who's conducting research on the role of checklists in EMS. I'll go diving into my stack of magazines later to find his name and more info. When I think about things like intubation (esp. RSI) and some of the other high-risk, high acuity, low instance skills/calls we do I think that a checklist might be an excellent idea and this research seems to support this. I'm not advocating cheat sheets for everything we do, but perhaps there might room for this sort of resource?

[mobey]

I dunno if an actual checklist would work out too well (no nurse to fill it out) but I am a big fan of having laminated checksheets in the unit just to look at and do a mental checklist.

Again.... there are people who need this and people who don't.