A specialty known for its brevity, emergency medicine can be appropriately summed up in haiku form. This is a collection of haikus about life in the emergency department.
I know we just met,
But tell me about your poop.
Pants down, quick finger.
Oh la la, Lasix!
Battle those potato chips!
CHF warzone.
CT negative.
Rule out subarachnoid bleed.
Thunderclap? Tap that!
Ketones! Mind the gap.
DKA, you’re just too sweet.
No more Mountain Dew.
Rigid abdomen.
I don’t think those are just abs.
Call surgery stat.
Shake it up, baby!
Twist and shout! Oh, twist and shout!
Your torsed ovary.
LVAD and chest pain
Heart sounds like a lawnmower.
I miss your ‘lub dub’.
Like Dorothy in Oz,
It’s tornado time. BiPAP!
Don’t smoke heroin(e).
STEMI! Call cath now!
Aspirin! Ticagrelor?
Whatever Cards wants.
What are we treating?
I don’t know, but it’s Sepsis!
Antibiotics.
Cocked up eyebrow raise.
Bell’s palsy, you are so coy.
Why do you do that?!
Midnight chief complaint.
You put what in your anus?
Aw man, this again.
Oh baby baby
Oh no, that is a baby!
Quick! Catch it! Clamp it!
Emergency Med
Just keep calm and dispo on.
Life can be so strange.
Image credit: Emergency by urbanworkbench licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Resident Physician Contributing Writer
University of Chicago
Amy Faith Ho, MD is an emergency physician, published writer and national speaker on issues pertaining to healthcare, with work featured in Forbes, Chicago Tribune, NPR, KevinMD, and TEDx. Full works at amyfaithho.com.
