Impact of a focused transthoracic echocardiography training course for rescue applications among anesthesiology and critical care medicine practitioners: a prospective study.

OBJECTIVE To investigate the impact of a sequence of educational interventions in a one-day course on focused transthoracic echocardiography (FOTE) by anesthesia and critical care practitioners. DESIGN A prospective analysis of the educational data. SETTING Educational setting in two academic medical centers and a medical meeting workshop organized by one of these institutions. PARTICIPANTS Fifty-six anesthesia and critical care providers, divided into three groups, participated separately in a FOTE training course. INTERVENTIONS All participants received a sequence of educational intervention as follows: A standardized, multiple-choice pretest; a lecture on cardiac and lung ultrasound; and a FOTE "hands-on" training session. The same standardized test was administered and graded as a posttest. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS Fifty-six professionals attended the course in three separate groups: The first were cardiothoracic anesthesia fellows (n = 16) (group 1), the second included critical care practitioners (n = 21) (group 2), and the third were general anesthesiologists (n = 19) (group 3). Parasternal views were most difficult to obtain for all groups (58.1, 63.8, and 58%, respectively). The mean written test scores increased from 14.9±2 to 21.0±2.3 in group 1; from 12.3±3.8 to 19.2±3.7 in group 2; 12±3.5 to 21±2.4 in group 3, (p = 0.0003, 0.00005, 0.0001, respectively). CONCLUSIONS A FOTE training course improves image acquisition skills and knowledge to the same level independently of professional background and level of experience in critical care ultrasound.