Graham and Parke recently published the first of an occasional series of articles whose aim is to stimulate interest in and discussion on the care of critically ill adults in the emergency department (ED) setting.¹ A further eight articles have been commissioned by the EMJ Editorial Board addressing emergency airway care, respiratory failure, sepsis, coma, renal failure, drug and fluid therapy, monitoring, and the principles of patient transfer.

The series is timely and reflects current trends in emergency medicine (EM) in the UK and elsewhere. In England and Wales we are obliged to ensure that the patient journey through the ED is completed within 4 h in 98% of cases. This has often been achieved by a process of segmentation: the triage of selected patients to platforms other than the main ED, such as …