The provision of intravenous fluids is no trivial intervention. Indeed, one eminent nephrologist has called for medical students to receive, not a 'white coat ceremony' at the outset of their education, but instead a 'normal saline ceremony.' This pomp is an occasion whereby the fledgling physician imbibes a reverence for sodium chloride. To hold a bag of resuscitation fluid should rouse veneration no different than grasping an ampule of morphine or vial of piperacillin-tazobactam. Thus, a zealous awareness of the balance between therapy and toxicity is required for all things we inject into another beings' veins.

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