In this issue, Dr. David Mutrie illustrates both the utility of departmental care protocols and the caution we must take in drawing conclusions from them. The latter point is particularly important if one wishes to apply these conclusions to other institutions.

The Thunder Bay Regional Hospital (TBRH), in Ontario, established simple guidelines for the management of patients with chest pain. Following the implementation of these guidelines, Mutrie reports shorter chest pain assessment times and reduced admission rates for non-myocardial infarction and non-unstable angina patients, without any obvious increase in inappropriate discharge of patients with ischemic disease. Can we therefore conclude that the guidelines were responsible for these improvements and that this set of guidelines would similarly improve performance in other emergency departments? The answer, unfortunately, is No. The fact is, the establishment of any organized approach to a clinical problem tends to improve performance. This is perhaps a sad reflection on “individual” practice patterns, but it is true nonetheless.