ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This report describes our 1-year experience with an emergency abdominal ultrasound course that we developed for emergency medicine residents and physicians. METHODS: The five-hour course consisted of didactic lectures and hands-on practice. A 1-hour didactic lecture was provided. The lecture consisted of basic ultrasound physics and principles, and anatomy for abdominal ultrasound. In the hands-on session, the instructors demonstrated the abdominal ultrasound techniques and then the students practiced on standard patients. Participants evaluated the programs using a five or ten point Likert scale. After two months to one year, the participants evaluated the usefulness of the course, their knowledge, and their self confidence. RESULTS: A total of 61 trainees participated in eight courses. The evaluation scores for overall quality of content, clinical utility, quality of educational method, quality of instructor, and time allocation were 4.4+/-0.7, 4.5+/-0.6, 4.3+/-0.6, 4.4+/-0.6, 4.1+/-0.7, respectively. Score of self-confidence of each scan before and after the course were as follows: liver scan, 3.2+/-2.1 to 6.9+/-1.2; gallbladder and bile duct scan 3.0+/-2.5 to 6.9+/-1.2; pancreas scan, 2.4+/-2.1 to 6.3+/-1.3; renal scan, 3.6+/-2.6 to 7.6+/-1.3. Evaluation scores were followed up after two months to one year to estimate self confidence of each scan. Results were as follows: liver scan, 6.1+/-1.5; gallbladder and bile duct scan, 6.5+/-1.6; pancreas scan, 5.5+/-1.8; renal scan, 7.2+/-1.5. CONCLUSION: The Emergency Abdominal Ultrasound Course is a fairly successful course. But continuous improvement of educational content, and development of an objective evaluation tool need to be done.