The Q Word Podcast

A new mom rushes in carrying a blue baby, or any other trauma patient arrives without warning—no radio, no heads-up. How do you stay one step ahead when chaos comes with zero notice? In this episode, Nyssa, Lisa, and their guest Lisa Wolf from HOW TO NOT KILL YOUR PATIENT dive into managing the "Zero Warning Crisis Patient." From optimizing your triage setup to having a bulletproof emergency plan,...

Nyssa and Lisa talk to Up My Nursing Game 's host Annie Fulton as part of a special National Nurse's Week Podcrawl - a veritable cornucopia of all things shock related, shared across seven top medical podcasts!  Learn about hypovolemic shock, how your Kool-Aid recipe applies to understanding the qualities of the fluid in your patient's vasculature, what to look out for as warning signs of a danger...

In this episode, we reveal the three (plus bonus) critical phrases that can make all the difference in patient care.  Lisa and Nyssa break down the significance of these ominous declarations, and discuss the swift decisive actions that ER nurses must take when confronted with these signals.

Sometimes, the most complicated problems can be solved with the simplest solutions.  Nyssa and Lisa discuss "the checklist" - an elegant tool which revolutionized safety protocols in the field of aviation, and how they can - and should - be used in emergency medicine to increase favorable outcomes in patient care.

Coin-shaped button batteries are used in many common household items; they are often and easily picked up by toddlers and plopped directly into their mouths., where their alkaline properties can lead to fatal consequences.  Nyssa and Lisa talk to pediatric flight nurse LaKeisha Neely about how to recognize the symptoms of button battery ingestion, and how to treat those patients before damage is d...

RSI is a common high stakes procedure done in emergent airways in the ER, but imagine how your patients must feel if they regain awareness during paralysis. One patient said "it was the worst pain he'd ever had and it was unbearable." How can your ER team avoid unwittingly contributing to this pain? Nyssa and Lisa examine a study that reveals the prevalence of awareness with paralysis in the ER an...

Superstitious behavior is one thing, but Nyssa and Lisa have found proof that saying the dreaded Q word in the ER may indeed have a quantifiable impact on whether or not you have an out-of-control shift.  Dive deep into the cause and effect relationship between luck and chaos, and learn all about the pandemonium an errant utterance can have on your practice.

Dumb people doing dumb things is nothing new, but Lisa and Nyssa - with special guest Dr. Cory Nonnemacher  - examine how the viral challenge trend has led to a whole new generation of dangerous stunts being performed for likes and lolz by today's social-media hungry kids.  Learn what challenges like the "Skullbreaker", "Milk Crate" and "Scalp Pop" look like when they present in your ERs, and what...

In the second half of this special two-part episode, Lisa and Nyssa continue their discussion of human trafficking, this time investigating how and why an ER visit offers a potential escape route to victims of this global criminal enterprise.  Learn how to recognize it, how to stop it, and how to protect yourself and your patient when you encounter it.  

Whether you know it or not, as a healthcare professional, you have probably encountered a victim of human trafficking at least once in your practice.  People of all ages, genders, backgrounds, and origins are trafficked every day, in every town in America.  In this first half of a special two-part episode, Lisa and Nyssa discuss the particulars and statistics of this widespread and rapidly growing...

Patients rely on nurses to alleviate their suffering, but what can nurses do to protect themselves from the weight and stress of providing care for the sick and dying?  Nyssa and Lisa talk to Ariel Brown and AnnMarie Papa about The Emotional PPE Project, an initiative born out of the overwhelmingly increased burden placed on healthcare workers during the COVID crisis. This no cost, no insurance re...

The contribution a nurse makes to their community is heroic, and the Nurse Honor Guard was created to celebrate that contribution each time one of these heroes passes away.  Nyssa and Lisa speak with Julie Murray about this important and necessary program to pay tribute to fallen nurses, one that can be easily established in every city and town to honor the work these healthcare professionals do t...

Nurses can learn a lot from case studies but they run the risk of being pretty snoozey. Not these three stories! Check out these bizarre case studies and the ER lessons that we learn from them. Nyssa originally presented this lecture live, in front of an audience at the excellent Southeastern Seaboard Symposium in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Enjoy "The Chef Without a Tongue", "Eleven Blue Men" a...

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. 

Supraglottic airways are getting more and more spotlight time.  Nyssa and Lisa discuss how, when you have a patient that comes in from the prehospital world with a SGA airway in place, the best practice is to leave it alone if it's working until you've addressed bigger issues.  Seems simple, right?  Let's find out why this paradigm shift is so important, and how to incorporate it into your practic...

In this special episode, recorded live at the FlightBridge ED FAST21 conference in Nashville in May, 2021 , Nyssa and Lisa reveal how and why one of the most ubiquitous tools used in every hospital and doctor's office may be inaccurate in up to 13% of the population, and what you can do to correct this serious and pervasive issue in your practice.

Let's face it: treating arrest after a blunt trauma may very well be a daily experience in your practice, but the standard protocols for resuscitation can actually do as much harm as good.  Nyssa and Lisa talk to Dr. Amanda Humphries-Ventura about her approach to reviving a profusely bleeding and broken patient, so that nurses in both the ER and the pre-hospital environment can make simple but imp...

Nyssa and Lisa review Paul Graham's classic productivity argument , and reframe it in the context of hospital employees, where the administration (a.k.a. managers) and the boots-on-the-ground medical personnel, specifically nurses (a.k.a. makers), are often at odds because of their wildly divergent schedules.  So how is a 9-5, M-F management team supposed to train, meet with, evaluate, and develop...

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,...

Following our Special Populations in Trauma series, and still sponsored by the Georgia Region V Regional Trauma Advisory Committee (RTAC), Nyssa and Lisa talk with educator Brittany Smith about how to care for what can be considered the most special, at risk population of patient: the neurodivergent.  In this first part of our two-part series, learn how to recognize the signs of ASD, ADD, ODD, and...

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, bu...

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, bu...

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, bu...

This 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, b...

The LEMON mnemonic device works well for scheduled surgeries or other stable pre-op patients, but not so great in the ER.  Nyssa and Lisa are joined by airway innovator Dave Olvera, who has developed a new way to think about how to assess difficult intubations.