Imagine you are sitting on the runway, waiting to take off to your holiday destination. As you begin to taxi the pilot announces that there is an engine warning light flashing, but that in his experience this almost always amounts to nothing and both him and co-pilot have made a pragmatic decision to proceed, given that the flight was already running late. In anaesthesia, one of the most fundamental decisions we take is whether or not to anaesthetise someone, something that can be relatively simple or profoundly complex given the circumstances. However, there are situations you would think that as a body of responsible professionals we would all agree on. Research from Oxford suggests that this may not be the case and that there is in fact a good deal of difference of opinion, particularly when it comes to matters of patient safety. In this podcast we talk with lead author Paul Greig about his interesting and thought-provoking work looking at risk tolerance in anaesthetists.

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“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.

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