Two lists. The first is what I reach for during a consultation; the second is where I go to read. Each entry says when I’d use it. Australian sources first, since most of what I publish assumes you are somewhere else.

Clinic tools

Point of care. Bookmark these.

• CVD Check — the 2023 Australian cardiovascular risk calculator. Use this one for Australian patients; Framingham-based tools overestimate here.
• CHA₂DS₂-VA — stroke risk in atrial fibrillation. Note VA, not VASc: the sex category has been dropped in current guidance.
• SPARC — shared decision-making for anticoagulation in AF. For the conversation rather than the number.
• MDCalc — the general calculator library. Worth knowing which scores it has before you need one.
• The NNT — numbers needed to treat and harm, graded. The fastest way to find out whether an intervention is worth the conversation.
• Trip — evidence search across guidelines, reviews and primary literature at once.
• ARTG search — what is actually registered in Australia, and in what form.
• FDA medication guides — US labelling, useful when a drug is newer there than here.
• PedEM Procedures — paediatric procedures, stepwise.

Reference

Australian

• Australian Prescriber — independent prescribing commentary written for Australian practice. First stop when a drug class has shifted and you want a readable account of why.
• Australian Clinical Practice Guidelines portal — the NHMRC register. Use it to find whether an Australian guideline exists before reaching for an overseas one.
• Heart Foundation — atrial fibrillation — Australian AF guidance, including anticoagulation thresholds.
• Poisons Information Centre — 13 11 26 from anywhere in Australia, 24 hours. Ring before you look anything up.
• NETS — newborn and paediatric emergency transport. Worth knowing the referral pathway before the night you need it.

Drugs

• DrugBank — pharmacology, targets, interactions. Where I go when I want the mechanism rather than the dose.
• PharmGKB — pharmacogenomics. Useful for the patient who metabolises something unexpectedly, and for working out whether that is a real possibility or a convenient story.
• LactMed — drugs in breastfeeding. Moved to NCBI Bookshelf when TOXNET was retired; the old address is dead.
• MotherToBaby — exposures in pregnancy and lactation, with the evidence behind each summary.

Evidence

• Cochrane Library — systematic reviews. Read the plain language summary, then check the date; a 2011 review of a question that has moved is worse than nothing.
• NICE — UK guidance, but the most transparent reasoning of any guideline body. Useful even where the recommendation does not transfer.
• NCBI Bookshelf — full-text textbooks and reference works, free. Deeper than a search engine and properly sourced.

Physiology and pathology

• Deranged Physiology — Alex Yartsev’s applied physiology, written for the CICM primary. The best free explanation of the subject anywhere.
• WebPath — the Internet Pathology Laboratory, University of Utah. Thousands of annotated gross and microscopic images.

Emergency and paediatrics

• Life in the Fast Lane — Australian, and the ECG library alone justifies the bookmark.
• Pediatric EM Morsels — short, practical paediatric emergency pieces. Good for the presentation you see twice a year and want to think about properly.
• EMCrit — resuscitation and critical care. Opinionated, and says so, which is the point.

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Last checked: 17 October 2026. Links rot. If one of these is dead, tell me.