Summary
This blended learning programme is a skills-based practical course delivered over three days in The Pillar Centre for Transformative Healthcare by emergency physicians with international reputations and experience in the teaching point of care ultrasound.
The programme provides a practical hands-on overview of the skills required for the application of ultrasound in the acute setting.
The role of point of care ultrasound (POCUS) – an ultrasonography performed and assessed by the clinician at the bedside – as an extension of the clinical examination in the acute assessment of trauma, as well undifferentiated shock in medical and surgical patients, has been rapidly evolving in Ireland.
As ultrasound equipment continues to become more compact, higher quality and less expensive, increasing numbers of emergency departments and hospitals now have access to POCUS. However, they are limited in their appropriate usage due to a lack of knowledge and familiarity.
The ability to use real time dynamic images obtained immediately allows findings to be directly correlated by a clinician with a patient's presenting symptoms and signs, and is easily repeated as these may change. It has been adopted for usage by various specialties, and its applications can be broadly divided into: procedural, diagnostic and screening.
Suitable for: SHOs and registrars in emergency medicine, all surgical specialities, general and acute medicine; critical care clinicians.