Clinical skills

The Calcium page has been updated to indicate that the use of albumin corrected calcium formulae are no longer recommended due to their inaccuracy.

The Interpretation of investigation results page has been updated with additional information about analytical errors.

The Hyponatraemia page has been simplified by the removal of reference to factors affecting [Na+] when using flame photometric or indirect ion sensing methods as these are rarely, if ever used in current practice.

The Hypernatraemia page has had a number of other minor updates.

The Hypernatraemia page has been updated with a formula for calculating the volume of 0.45% saline required to replace TBW deficits.

The Hypernatraemia page has been updated with a more accurate free water deficit formula.

The Hypophosphataemia page has had a number of minor updates.

The Phosphate page has been updated with an expanded range of normal phosphate levels for different ages.

The Hyponatraemia page has been updated with information about the use of NaHCO3 for the treatment of severe hyponatraemia.

The Hyponatraemia page has been updated with additional information about osmotic demyelination syndrome.

The Blood gasses page has been updated to better reflect that, if you are going to do calculations on blood gas results at all, you need to use arterial O2, CO2 and HCO3 values. Better still, learn something else that is less prone to error, better validated and more clinically useful…..

The Liver function tests page has been revised and reformatted to improve information display.

The Liver function tests page has been updated with a new table of the different LDH isoenzymes.

The Hyperkalaemia page has been updated with emphasis of the poor quality evidence suggesting lack of efficacy of various therapies.

The Hyponatraemia page has had a number of other minor updates.

The Intravenous contrast page has been updated with a new segment on IV contrast extravasation.

The Intravenous contrast page has been updated with an expanded list of contraindications to IV contrast administration.

The Management of violence page has been updated with a new segment on considerations in the agitated elderly patient.

The Management of violence page has been updated with additional information on how to de-escalate your response.

The Management of violence page has been updated with additional information on when to abandon de-escalation attempts.