BMJ 1995;311:571 (26 August)

Letters

The 10 commandments of accident and emergency radiology

EDITOR,--A H Troughton and I Kendall1 and T F Beattie and colleagues2 comment on our article giving 10 commandments of accident and emergency radiology.3 As we stated in the introduction, the article was written for inexperienced senior house officers working in accident and emergency departments. The authors of the letters either did not read this or are unaware that, commonly, inexperienced accident and emergency doctors work without direct supervision.4

In answer to Troughton and Kendall's comments, we wish to point out the following. Rules 1, 2, and 3 emphasise the need to assess the patient first and order a radiograph only if an underlying abnormality is considered. Radiographs of joints with long bones should not be obtained if the joints are clinically normal. The article states the need to have "an accessible library of normal radiographs in the accident and emergency department as well as reference books that show normal . . . [Full text of this article]


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This article has been cited by other articles:

  • Todd, C J, Palmer, C., Camilleri-Ferrante, C, Freeman, C J, Laxton, C E, Parker, M J, Payne, B V, Rushton, N (1995). Differences in mortality after fracture of hip. BMJ 311: 1025b-1025 [Full text]  
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