By Dr. Jimmy Lee

Why did you do the course?
Despite seeing thousands of XR scans at this point, I was still not where I wanted to be with my confidence in reporting scans, particularly chest x-rays. The A&E Radiology Survival Guide is a staple in every ED and these are the guys who wrote what is highly touted as the best ED radiology guide for EM trainees out there.

Who is the course aimed at?
Both days had a largely mix. It is aimed at all NCHDs, though most were Intern to Junior Registrar level. The CXR day had a number of Senior registrars and even some consultants. Many of the trainees I met were actually doing the course with the aim of doing Radiology SpR training in the future.

Give a brief overview of the course
The A&E Survival Course was a general day covering mostly trauma plain films. They touched on, but largely excluded CXRs, as they feel it is too large an area to simply cover in an hour.

The CXR day covered the many different aspects of CXRs, from collapse to consolidation and everything weird and whacky in between.

Each area was covered first in a short tutorial as a large group, and then smaller tutorial groups where you split into two’s to run through a practice quiz. The quiz answers were then discussed in detail with the radiologists.

It should be noted that Ultrasound, CTs, and MRIs were not covered.

Coffee and Meals were provided all day, and it can’t go without saying they were of a pretty high standard as far as courses go!

Would you recommend the course?
I can’t say enough about this course. It has made me infinitely more confident in my reading of plain films. I had heard of most of the pearls from reading trauma films from my Ortho rotation but this course really assured me that I’m not missing anything when I’m reading these films. The CXR day on the other hand terrified me in the complexities there are to that common picture. There are so many things I had always wondered about (?consolidation, ?infiltrates, ?query) that were answered definitively. I will definitely have to go over it again, which will be easy since with each course, both the A&E Survival course and the CXR course, you get the textbook included in the cost of the course.

When is the course usually run and how much did it cost?
My course was run in December, and they are run 3-4 times a year. Each day cost £135.

Where can we find more information?
The course was run by radiology-courses.com and they can be contacted at shelley.brier@radiology-courses.com.

Submitted on December 22, 2015. Published online on 01/01/2016.

Jimmy Lee is a Year 2 Core Specialist Trainee in Emergency Medicine, Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital, Crumlin, Dublin, Ireland.