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Dr. David B. Goodie, a Specialist Anesthetist with the Fiji Orthopaedic Outreach, recently returned from a weeklong charitable medical mission in Fiji. For this mission, Sonosite lent Dr. Goodie an M-Turbo, which he promptly put to good use at the Lautoka Hospital in Fiji. He writes:

The use of opioids in the ICU and the post-operative period is common, with patients often receiving opioids even after simple surgeries. Though opioids are effective in providing fast pain relief, the side effects of respiratory depression, cough suppression, confusion, drowsiness, nausea, vomiting and potential addiction make the sole reliance on opioids risky.

India and Southeast Asia are home to the endangered Asian elephant, which is rapidly declining in numbers due to poaching and habitat destruction.

Time is of the essence in the emergency department, where a prompt diagnosis can literally mean the difference between life and death.

Professional sportsmen and women rely on rapid, accurate assessment and treatment of injuries to allow them to regain match fitness and return to the field at the earliest opportunity.

In the last decade there has been a widespread adoption of portable ultrasound in point of care (POCUS) for primary care.

According to a systematic review recently published in Annals of Family Medicine, point-of-care ultrasound can not only reduce costs, but can also be adopted by physicians relatively quickly, especially with the most basic exams.

According to a systematic review recently published in Annals of Family Medicine, point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) can reduce costs and improve diagnostic abilities in family medicine and other clinical settings.

Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is widely used in nephrology for guiding the creation of fistulas and informing decisions on their viability and performance for dialysis. 

STARS (Shock Trauma Air Rescue Service) Air Ambulance is a non-profit emergency air transport organization* that serves rural communities in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada.

Funded by donations from private individuals, STARS was founded by Dr. Gregory Powell, who had seen the difference that helicopter transport could make in patient outcomes as an observer in a M.A.S.H. unit during the Vietnam War. 

Dr. Luanne Freer is, to put it mildly, comfortable with being uncomfortable.

An advocate for the expansion of the use of point-of-care ultrasound, Dr. Yasmin Endlich is an anesthesiologist who practices medicine in Australia and regularly travels to Papua New Guinea to provide medical training to local physicians. Here, she explains why nerve blocks are a crucial tool in a rural anesthetist’s arsenal:

Dr. Achai Bulabek is a clinical officer with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). At age 28, she is currently serving a region between Sudan and South Sudan (her native country). Her hospital recently adopted a point-of-care ultrasound system (POCUS) that is now frequently used to diagnose patient trauma and guide needle-based procedures such as paracentesis and thoracentesis.

Ultrasound-guidance has proven invaluable for the regional neurosurgical center at the Salford Royal Hospital outside Manchester, England.

According to a study conducted by Harvard researchers, emergency physicians in community-hospital settings that chose to use diagnostic point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) in patient care saved patients, insurance companies, and hospitals significant sums of money, even if the results of an ultrasound did not alter a care path.

Mosul, one of Iraq’s largest cities, is slowly rebuilding its healthcare infrastructure after years of war. Dr. Henryk Pich is doing his part to help.

Ultrasound is a vital tool for vascular surgeons in the 21^st century. In the following essay, Dr. Fidel Fernández Quesada, a sixth-generation vascular surgeon and associate professor at the University of Granada, Spain, describes the difference that ultrasound has made to his clinical practice, and reflects on what his forefathers would have made of such technological advancement.