This issue of Emergency Medicine Practice focuses on determining which patients will benefit from regional anesthesia and how to perform the most common facial anesthesia procedures.

Nearly all pediatricians avail themselves to pediatric advanced life support (PALS) training and certification. Most of us blindly accept the PALS guidelines as being true and unquestioningly commit them to memory. But is there evidence that PALS works? Who comes up with these guidelines and how do they do it? How do these guidelines work and what happens after the initial resuscitation steps have been completed? This article addresses these questions.

This issue of Pediatric Emergency Medicine Practice reviews the available research on mammalian bite wounds in children to help the emergency clinician choose a strategy for managing the care of their pediatric patients.

This issue of Emergency Medicine Practice addresses cervical spine injuries by providing a systematic approach that optimizes resource utilization and minimizes identification failure.

Acute spinal cord injuries (ASCIs) remain a devastating consequence of traumatic injuries around the globe. These injuries cause permanent, profound disabilities and lead to changes in lifestyle ranging from employment to marital status.

In this issue of Pediatric Emergency Medicine PRACTICE, we will present an approach to pediatric shock based, as far as possible, on the available evidence.

This issue of Emergency Medicine Practice describes management strategies for common orthopedic sports injuries. Prior issues of Emergency Medicine Practice, such as the January 2000 issue on mild head trauma, the February 2000 issue on back pain, the October 2001 issue on cervical spine injuries, the November 2001 issue on wrist injuries, and the May 2002 issue on ankle injuries, also provide pertinent information.

The crashing infant is a challenge in any setting. From the largest specialty children's center to the smallest rural ED, a dying baby creates havoc. Even when you think you're prepared, things appear chaotic. Procedures go wrong; rarely used equipment seems to disappear. IV access becomes impossible for even the most experienced hands; your mind freezes when trying to calculate drug doses. The right decisions must come quickly or a baby will die.

This issue of Emergency Medicine Practice aims to fill this void by describing the state of the art ED management of wrist injuries.