Avoiding nosocomial infection in anaesthesia.

The "Availability Rule for Epidurals" should be stated in terms of response time to the bedside rather than building location of the anaesthetist if it is to be of any help to those of us in remote communities. In my small town distances are short and the three anaesthetists all have response times of five minutes from either home or office to any bedside in our hospital, lntermittant "top-ups" are used and the anaesthetist is always at the bedside for these. The physical presence of the anaesthetist in the hospital, if he is tied up in the OR and unable to respond to his epidural patient, is about as useful as the moose pellets which litter the ground in this part of the country.