Should Doctors be ACLS Certified?

Since I started practicing medicine a few decades ago, I have been recertified every 2 years for Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS). Readers might not perceive any newsworthiness regarding this issue. After all, I am a doctor and I should know how to respond to unexpected medical emergencies. Except I have barely a clue.

Yes, I pass the exam every other year. The truth is that I do so because all of the institutions that I have worked for require this certification. There must be a group of bureaucrats sequestered somewhere who decided that physicians should be ACLS certified, at least doctors like me. But, as is so often true in life, mission creep sweeps in participants who should have been excluded in the effort.

The only moments that ACLS has my attention are those 2 hours every other year when I recertify. In between these episodes, I don’t read about it, dream about it and certainly never do it.

Advanced life support is not simply a certification status – it’s a profession. Physicians and other medical professionals who truly have these skills are highly trained and retrained and practice in the field. They are similar to trained athletes who are always ready to be called up for service.

When any of us calls 911 and paramedics arrive, these ACLS professionals know what they’re doing. They are constantly training to remain current in their field exactly as I do in my medical specialty. I am a gastroenterologist whose expertise does not include interpreting complex and abnormal cardiac rhythms, knowing the doses and means of administration of drugs I’ve never prescribed or knowing how to insert a breathing tube into someone’s trachea.

I do think that all of us should be able to perform Basic Life Support (BLS) so that we might keep someone alive until the paramedics – the actual professionals – arrive on the scene.

Similarly, over the years I have come across various ‘weekend courses’ that aim to teach physicians a new procedure or technique. Perhaps, I’m a slow learner but the procedures and techniques I use have taken me quite a bit longer than a weekend to learn.

So, if I confront an urgent medical situation, before relying upon my ACLS muscle memory, I will be dialing 911.

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