2 min reading · 15 min station · reminders at 2 min

Station - Instructions for candidate

You are an intern working in the Emergency Department of a regional hospital 100 km from Perth. The hospital has a general surgeon and an anaesthetist on call, a CT scanner and a blood bank, but no interventional radiology or intensive care unit. It is 11 pm.

Joanna Reyes, 24, a motorcyclist, has just arrived by ambulance after being hit by a car at about 60 km/h and thrown from her bike. She was wearing a helmet and was not knocked out. The paramedics have placed a cervical collar and blocks, applied 15 L of oxygen and inserted one cannula. She is short of breath and complaining of left-sided chest pain. The senior doctor is 15 minutes away; a registered nurse is with you.

Your tasks are to:

  1. Perform an A to E primary survey and treat as you go.
  2. Request any relevant investigations and interpret the results provided.
  3. Summarise your findings to the examiner with your working diagnosis and differential diagnoses.
  4. Outline your immediate management plan to the examiner.
  • You do NOT need to take a full history.
  • A registered nurse is at the bedside and will carry out your instructions; the on-call surgeon and anaesthetist can be contacted by phone.

This is a 15-minute station, with 2 minutes of reading time.

Ask the examiner

Say what you would examine or request, the way you would in the station. Nothing is named until you ask for it.

Whatever the examiner recognises is revealed below. Or pick a numbered item to reveal it blind.

Investigations

Ask for a category the way you would in the station: “Can I have the obs and a set of bloods?”

Examination

Say what you would examine and how; the examiner reports what you would find.

After treatment

Once you have acted, ask how the patient has responded.

Candidate view - instructions only. Open the full station for the patient script, the examiner pack and the marking sheet.