Long-term gain after team-based learning experience in a pediatric clerkship.

BACKGROUND: Team-based learning (TBL) increases student engagement, value of teamwork, and performance on standardized evaluations. PURPOSE: The authors implemented a 3rd-year pediatric TBL curriculum, evaluating its effect on satisfaction, engagement, value of teamwork, and short-term and long-term academic performance. METHOD: Students evaluated the TBL curriculum and core lectures through satisfaction, engagement and value of team surveys. Scores on short-term and long-term examinations were compared to historical data. RESULTS: The first implementation year, students were less likely to enjoy TBL sessions compared to lectures. The 2nd year, this difference lessened. Through both years, students reported dramatic increases in classroom engagement during TBL compared to lecture. Students developed a greater value for teams after participating in TBL. Short-term and long-term examination scores improved significantly. CONCLUSIONS: Both short-term and long-term performance improved with implementation of TBL, emphasizing the benefits of a curriculum that allows students to critically engage with material.

SAFEST: Use of a Rubric to Teach Safety Reporting to Pediatric House Officers.

BACKGROUND: Among the many modalities of error detection in academic pediatric hospitals, patient safety reporting is an important component, particularly for unexpected events. Residents recognize the importance of reporting but cite some barriers to doing so. A rubric was developed to guide resident reporting and streamline information gathering in patient safety reports. The rubric used the acronym SAFEST as a reminder to include 6 key elements:1. Staff involved in the incident.2. Actual event description.3. Follow-up initiated.4. Effect on patient.5. Standard of care described.6. To-do/suggestions for improvement. OBJECTIVES: This study was designed to determine if the addition of this educational rubric into a standard quality improvement curriculum improves the consistency of information documented in patient safety reports as a subset of a larger quality improvement project aimed at improving safety reporting. METHODS: A team of faculty members analyzed individual resident error reports for adherence to the 6 tenets of the SAFEST mnemonic. RESULTS: From April to October of 2014, 2015, and 2016, a convenience sample of 131, 110, and 132 reports, respectively, were extracted and analyzed. For the rates of reporting "staff involved" and "standard of care," the differences over time were significant, both with P values < 0.001. After training, residents were 2.2 times more likely to report on the "staff involved" in the error and 1.8 times more likely to report the "standard of care." DISCUSSION: These results describe successful education on a rubric designed to improve the content of patient safety reports.

Variability in Threshold for Medication Error Reporting Between Physicians, Nurses, Pharmacists, and Families.

BACKGROUND: Voluntary medication error reporting is an imperfect resource used to improve the quality of medication administration. It requires judgment by front-line staff to determine how to report enough to identify opportunities to improve patients' safety but not jeopardize that safety by creating a culture of "report fatigue." OBJECTIVE: This study aims to provide information on interpretability of medication error and the variability between the subgroups of caregivers in the hospital setting. METHODS: Survey participants included nursing, physician (trainee and graduated), patient/families, pharmacist across a large academic health system, including an attached free-standing pediatric hospital. Demographics and survey questions were collected and analyzed using Fischer's exact testing with SAS v9.3. RESULTS: Statistically significant variability existed between the four groups for a majority of the questions. This included all cases designated as administration errors and many, but not all, cases of prescribing events. Commentary provided in the free-text portion of the survey was sub-analyzed and found to be associated with medication allergy reporting and lack of education surrounding report characteristics. CONCLUSION: There is significant variability in the threshold to report specific medication errors in the hospital setting. More work needs to be done to further improve the education surrounding error reporting in hospitals for all noted subgroups.

Lemierre Syndrome Presenting as Acute Mastoiditis in a 2-Year-Old Girl with Congenital Dwarfism.

Lemierre syndrome is defined by septic thrombophlebitis of the internal jugular vein caused by Fusobacterium. Historically, these infections originate from the oropharynx and typically are seen in older children, adolescents and young adults. More recently, otogenic sources in younger children have been described with increasing frequency. We present a case of a two-year old, who initially developed an otitis media with perforation of the tympanic membrane and went on to develop mastoiditis and non-occlusive thrombosis of the venous sinus and right internal jugular vein. Fusobacterium necrophorum was grown from operative cultures of the mastoid, ensuing computed tomography scan revealed occlusion of the internal jugular vein and the patient was successfully treated with clindamycin, ciprofloxacin and enoxaparin. This case demonstrates the importance of considering Fusobacterium in otogenic infections and the consideration of Lemierre syndrome when F. necrophorum is identified.

Care of the complex chronically ill child by generalist pediatricians: lessons learned from pediatric palliative care.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Parents of children with complex chronic conditions report fragmented care, unmet medical needs, and financial strain from health care costs. The aim of this study was to identify both prevalent themes discussed during pediatric palliative care consultation of patients with complex chronic conditions cared for by pediatric generalists and variation in consultation content by age and timing of consultation in disease course. METHODS: Forty randomly selected initial inpatient or outpatient consultation notes authored by the pediatric palliative care team at an academic, tertiary care children's hospital. Inclusion required that patients were primarily cared for by general pediatricians, pediatric hospitalists, or pediatric intensivists, instead of subspecialists. Qualitative analysis by 5 team members utilizing consensus-based findings was used to develop themes. Descriptive statistics were used to describe variations in themes across age and disease course. RESULTS: Common themes included thorough review of patient baseline functioning, current symptoms, assessment of family's understanding of the prognosis of the patient, coordination of communication with other medical teams and outpatient health care services, consideration of caregiver resources and burdens, and offering a framework for decision-making. Variation in consult themes by age/disease course included more discussion of communication problems and symptom management when patients were at their baseline, but otherwise little variation was found. CONCLUSIONS: Common themes covered in initial consultations correspond with documented unmet needs for chronically ill children. There was no significant variation in consultation themes by age/disease course, suggesting that generalists could broadly apply palliative care techniques to improve family-centered care.

Assessing the validity evidence of an objective structured assessment tool of technical skills for neonatal lumbar punctures.

BACKGROUND: The lumbar puncture (LP) is a procedural competency deemed necessary by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and the Emergency Medicine and Pediatric Residency Review Committees. The emergency department (ED) is a primary site for residents to be evaluated performing neonatal LPs. Current evaluation methods lack validity evidence as assessment tools. OBJECTIVES: This was a pilot study to develop an objective structured assessment of technical skills for neonatal LP (OSATS-LP) and to document validity evidence for the instrument in regard to five sources of test validity: content, response process, relation to other variables, inter-rater reliability, and consequences of testing. METHODS: Pediatric residents were videotaped in the fall of 2011 for comparison of faculty evaluation of resident performance during a neonatal LP using a video-delayed format. Residents completed a demographic experience survey evaluating relations to other variables. Content and response process validity was obtained through expert panel meetings and resulted in the following seven domains of performance for the OSATS-LP: preparation, positioning, analgesia, needle insertion, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) collection, management of laboratory studies, and sterility. t-tests assessed significance between level of training, previous intensive care unit experience, and residents' self-assessed confidence in comparison with their total performance score. The inter-rater agreement of the OSATS-LP was obtained using the Fleiss' kappa for each domain. RESULTS: Sixteen pediatric residents completed the simulation with six raters evaluating each resident (96 ratings). The domains of sterility and CSF collection had moderate statistical reliability (κ = 0.41 and 0.51, respectively). The domains of preparation, analgesia, and management of laboratories had substantial reliability (κ = 0.60, 0.62, and 0.62, respectively). The domains of positioning and needle insertion were less reliable (κ = 0.16 and 0.16, respectively). Individuals who had completed one or more rotations in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) had a higher total score (12.5 vs. 16.9; p < 0.01). The residents' own perception of ability to perform an LP unsupervised did not result in a higher total score. CONCLUSIONS: The OSATS-LP has reasonable evidence in four of the five sources for test validity. This study serves as a launching point for using this tool in clinical environments such as the ED and, therefore, has the potential to provide real-time formative and summative feedback to improve resident skills and ultimately lead to improvements in patient care.

Characterization of central venous catheter-associated deep venous thrombosis in infants.

PURPOSE: Deep venous thrombosis (DVT) is a frequent complication in infants with central venous catheters (CVCs). We performed this study to identify risk factors and risk-reduction strategies of CVC-associated DVT in infants. METHODS: Infants younger than 1 year who had a CVC placed at our center from 2005 to 2009 were reviewed. Patients with ultrasonically diagnosed DVT were compared to those without radiographic evidence. RESULTS: Of 333 patients, 47% (155/333) had femoral, 33% (111/333) had jugular, and 19% (64/333) had subclavian CVCs. Deep venous thromboses occurred in 18% (60/333) of patients. Sixty percent (36/60) of DVTs were in femoral veins. Femoral CVCs were associated with greater DVT rates (27%; 42/155) than jugular (11%; 12/111) or subclavian CVCs (9%; 6/64; P < .01). There was a 16% DVT rate in those with saphenofemoral Broviac CVCs vs 83% (20/24) in those with percutaneous femoral lines (P < .01). Multilumen CVCs had higher DVT rates than did single-lumen CVCs (54% vs 6%, P < .01), and mean catheter days before DVT diagnosis was shorter for percutaneous lines than Broviacs (13 ± 17 days vs 30 ± 37 days, P = .02). Patients with +DVT had longer length of stay (86 ± 88 days vs 48 ± 48 days, P < .01) and higher percentage of intensive care unit admission (82% vs 70%, P = .02). CONCLUSIONS: Deep venous thrombosis reduction strategies in infants with CVCs include avoiding percutaneous femoral and multilumen CVCs, screening percutaneous lines, and early catheter removal.