Fellow Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters Norfolk, Virginia, United States
Background: Point-Of-Care Ultrasound (POCUS) is increasingly vital in pediatric practice due to its non-invasive nature, cost-effectiveness, portability, and real-time decision-making capabilities. POCUS aids in the diagnosis and management of many pathologies including skin infections, specifically distinguishing between cellulitis and abscesses. However, POCUS integration in pediatric residency programs is lacking, with many programs offering no formal curriculum. To address this gap, Kern's Six Steps Curriculum Development Model offers a structured approach to address this training gap through problem identification, needs assessment, goals and objectives, educational strategies, implementation, and evaluation. Objective: Develop and implement a concise POCUS training for pediatric interns to enhance their knowledge and comfort with ultrasound in pediatric practice. Design/Methods: This study evaluates a pilot curriculum designed to enhance pediatric interns' knowledge and comfort with ultrasound, focusing on identifying cellulitis vs. cellulitis with a drainable abscess. Novel phantom models, created at the Simulation Center at Eastern Virginia Medical School, are utilized in a ninety-minute curriculum featuring pre- and post-lecture surveys measuring knowledge and comfort levels and assessing their ability to distinguish between cellulitis and abscesses before and after the lecture. The curriculum includes ultrasound physics, instrumentation, and clinical applications in skin/soft tissue infections. Signal detection theory is employed to interpret data on participants' identification skills. A pre- and post-test design, including paired t-test or Wilcoxon test analysis, is used to compare survey data, evaluating the effectiveness of this POCUS curriculum.
