Urgent Matters

Dr. Erin Kane interviews patient flow experts Dr. Eugene Litvak, Dr. Peter Viccellio, and Hallie Kreul on the topic of the post-COVID surgical backlog and inpatient capacity. Tune in to hear how some hospitals have leveraged surgical smoothing to achieve the impossible dream: increased surgical bandwidth, abundant revenues, and timely care for ER patients.

Dr. Litvak and colleagues recently published on this topic in the Annals of Surgery: https://journals.lww.com/annalsofsurgery/Abstract/9000/How_Hospitals_can_Save_Lives_and_Themselves_.93645.aspx

Image: Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

Dr. Meltzer discusses concussion assessment with Dr. David Levine and Dr. Will Denq.

Dr. Levine is a practicing Emergency Medicine Physician and Regional Medical Director who also works directly with many companies across the county, focusing on utilizing technology to aid and improve the daily operations of clinical teams.

Dr. Denq is clinical assistant professor of emergency medicine at University of Arizona . Dr. Denq (pronounced Den) specializes in sports medicine. He also is an active blogger and has created an entire video series on EM ortho splinting on ALiEM. He is active in event medicine, including for the U.S. Ski and Snowboard teams.

Sponsored by BrainScope: a medical neurotechnology company that is improving brain health by providing objective, diagnostic insights that enable better patient care. The company’s BrainScope® device is the only FDA-cleared, portable, EEG-based platform that empowers physicians to quickly make accurate mild traumatic brain injury assessments. https://www.brainscope.com/

Marisa Dowling, MD, MPP is the GW Health Policy Fellow for the Class of 2021. Dr. Dowling graduated from Stanford University with a B.A. in Human Biology. She then attended Duke University for medical school and earned a Master in Public Policy degree from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Dr. Dowling completed residency training in Emergency Medicine at the University of Maryland in Baltimore.

Aisha T. Terry, MD, MPH, FACEP is an Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine and Health Policy at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Milken Institute School of Public Health in Washington, DC. There, she serves as Co-Director of the Department of Emergency Medicine’s Health Policy Fellowship, which trains physicians to be future public health and health policy leaders. She also serves as a Learning Community Leader, Clinical Public Health Mentor, Professional Development Mentor, and Clinical Skills and Reasoning Instructor in the School of Medicine. Dr. Terry has always been very active in the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) and was most recently elected to the ACEP Board of Directors.

MK Dowling, AT Terry, NL Kirilichin, JS Lee, JC Blanchard. United States Congressional COVID-19 Legislation: Recent Laws and Future Topics. Western Journal of Emergency Medicine 21 (5), 1037. Link: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/748005vg

Dr. Meltzer discusses POCUS in the Era of COVID-19 with Dr. Kathleen Ogle and Dr. Mike Blaivas including:

• Characteristic cardiac and lung findings

• The role of serial exams

• The role of POCUS in tracking disease progression

Dr. Kat Ogle is an Assistant Professor at the George Washington University. She is engaged in medical student, resident and fellow education. Her roles include Emergency Ultrasound Fellowship Director, Executive Chair of the Clinical Competency Committee for the residency, leading the Medical Education and Leadership Scholarly Concentration as well as Clinician as a Medical Educator course.

Dr. Michael Blaivas, Chief Medical Officer, EchoNous, is a board-certified emergency medicine physician, a recognized pioneer in emergency medicine, and has been involved with point-of-care ultrasound since 1993. He is currently an Affiliate Professor of Medicine, University of South Carolina School of Medicine.

Dr. Solomon is the Clinical Director of the National Human Genome Research Institute. He and Dr. Meltzer discuss what insights genomics research might be able tell us about COVID-19.

Dr. Meltzer talks about COVID-19 impact on the NYC area with Dr. Ethan Cowan. As the pandemic spread exponentially throughout the country, NYC has been dealing with the brunt of its effects for weeks. Dr. Cowan shares his experience on changes to flow, clinical research, and provider moral.

Dr. Meltzer talks about COVID-19 testing in the DC area with Disaster Medicine fellow Dr. Jordan Selzer. Including the strike team at-home testing, screening patients for symptoms, drive-through testing, and where it goes from here.

Dr. Meltzer and Dr. James Phillips, GW Emed Disaster and Operational Medicine section chief, and CNN Medical Analyst, have wide-ranging discussion on the COVID-19 including the R Naught value, the numbers coming out of China, the sensitivity and specificity of the tests, the impact at home for doctors, treatment studies, the effects of the pandemic on society after this is over, and the way culture may have on the spread.

Dr. Meltzer discusses transportation accident investigations and research with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chief Medical Officer Mary Pat McKay, MD, MPH. Topics include distracted driving, e-scooters, automated vehicles, and the role of the emergency medicine doctor to assist in preventing impairment accidents.

A joint podcast with EMRACast, Urgent Matters welcomes Dr. RJ Sontag. As EMRA’s 2019 Congressional Health Policy Fellow, Dr. Sontag worked with Dr. Ruiz on Capitol Hill to turn medical and policy research into legislative solutions on a wide range of topics, from firearm violence prevention to surprise billing to youth nicotine use. Dr. Ruiz discusses how ED problem-solving perspective approach can impact policy, advocacy, and a more holistic view of patient care.