1992 was the year Dr. Ian Stiell put Ottawa (and its ankles) on the map through his development of a new set of guidelines, called the Ottawa Ankle Rules. The guidelines were designed to help fellow emergency physicians decide whether a patient with foot or ankle pain needed an X-ray to diagnose a possible bone fracture.
At that time, about 2,000 patients were visiting the Civic’s emergency room with ankle injuries each year.
It was found that Dr. Stiell’s guidelines reduced the number of ankle X-rays without causing doctors to miss ankle fractures. Patients also spent less time in emergency rooms.
Dr. Stiell’s rules became adopted by hospitals in other parts of Canada, the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. The Ottawa Ankle Rules even appeared on prime-time television in an episode of the American medical drama series ER.
