Pediatric disaster preparedness curriculum across emergency medicine residencies

Abstract

Objective: To assess pediatric disaster medicine (PDM) instruction in emergency medicine (EM) residency programs and to identify barriers to integrating these skills into EM training. Methods: National survey study of United States EM Residency Program Directors (PDs) and Assistant PDs during the 2021-2022 academic year. Results: Of the 186 EM residency programs identified, a total of 24 responses were recorded with a response rate of 12.9 percent. Importance of training was rated 5.79 (standard deviation 2.51) using the Likert scale ranging from 1 to 10. Out of 24 programs, 17 (70.8 percent) do not have any PDM training as part of residency training. Live drill, simulation, and tabletop were identified as most effective methods to deliver PDM training with the Likert scale score of 4.78, 4.6, and 4.47, respectively. Senior trainees’ level of knowledge/ skills with family reunification (Likert 2.09/5; chemical-biologicalradiological-nuclear explosive 2.95/5) and mass casualty preparation of the emergency department (3.3/5) as assessed by the respondents. The main barrier to education included logistics, eg, space and costs (Likert 3.7/5), lack of didactic time (3.7/5), and limited faculty knowledge, skill, or experience (3.3/5). Conclusion: PDM training is lacking and requires standardization. This study highlights the opportunity for the creation of a model for EM resident education in PDM.