A Scoping Review of Boot Camps as a Transition, or Induction Training in Health Professions Education

Background Health professions education (HPE) has increasingly used “boot camps” as a promising approach to prepare learners for the transition to their next educational level (e.g. medical students entering residency) or before entering a specific field. However, current boot camp guidelines have not been widely developed or accepted and may have even strayed into different concepts. Aim To explore current practices of boot camps as an educational activity to transition into a new level of training or a new field in HPE. Methods Medical and education databases will be searched for studies reporting on boot camps. We will achieve our goal by 1) exploring the depth and breadth of evidence that characterizes boot camps across various disciplines in HPE, 2) synthesizing key components of boot camps to formulate an operational definition, and 3) proposing recommendations for best practices when developing an HPE boot camp. Importance This review will explore the literature pertaining to boot camps to formulate an operational definition and develop best practices of an HPE boot camp

Theophylline toxicity: An old poisoning for a new generation of physicians

A healthy 4-year-old female presented to the emergency department for vomiting and diarrhea. She was diagnosed with a urinary tract infection, treated with antibiotics and anti-emetics and discharged. Within four hours, her symptoms recurred, followed by decreasing responsiveness and seizures. She had significant hypokalemia, hyperglycemia, and a combined respiratory and metabolic acidosis. A sibling then mentioned that the patient ingested their father's 200 mg sustained-release theophylline tablets the previous morning. A serum theophylline level was immediately ordered and returned >444 μmol/L. The patient was intubated and treated with activated charcoal, antiemetics, potassium and intravenous fluids. She underwent continuous renal replacement therapy and her levels declined over the next 24 hours. She was extubated on hospital day 2 and discharged without sequelae. Theophylline ingestions are rare but potentially very serious. Physicians need to know how to diagnose and treat these ingestions. Keywords: Theophylline, Methylxanthine, Ingestion, Hemodialysi

A Core Outcome Measurement Set for Pediatric Critical Care

Objectives: To identify a PICU Core Outcome Measurement Set (PICU COMS), a set of measures that can be used to evaluate the PICU Core Outcome Set (PICU COS) domains in PICU patients and their families. Design: A modified Delphi consensus process. Setting: Four webinars attended by PICU physicians and nurses, pediatric surgeons, rehabilitation physicians, and scientists with expertise in PICU clinical care or research (n = 35). Attendees were from eight countries and convened from the Pediatric Acute Lung Injury and Sepsis Investigators Pediatric Outcomes STudies after PICU Investigators and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Collaborative Pediatric Critical Care Research Network PICU COS Investigators. Subjects: Measures to assess outcome domains of the PICU COS are as follows: cognitive, emotional, overall (including health-related quality of life), physical, and family health. Measures evaluating social health were also considered. Interventions: None. Measurements and Main Results: Measures were classified as general or additional based on generalizability across PICU populations, feasibility, and relevance to specific COS domains. Measures with high consensus, defined as 80% agreement for inclusion, were selected for the PICU COMS. Among 140 candidate measures, 24 were delineated as general (broadly applicable) and, of these, 10 achieved consensus for inclusion in the COMS (7 patient-oriented and 3 family-oriented). Six of the seven patient measures were applicable to the broadest range of patients, diagnoses, and developmental abilities. All were validated in pediatric populations and have normative pediatric data. Twenty additional measures focusing on specific populations or in-depth evaluation of a COS subdomain also met consensus for inclusion as COMS additional measures. Conclusions: The PICU COMS delineates measures to evaluate domains in the PICU COS and facilitates comparability across future research studies to characterize PICU survivorship and enable interventional studies to target long-term outcomes after critical illness.</p