Emergency Medicine

Conferences in Pediatric Emergency Medicine, with few exceptions, are held in the Emergency Medicine Conference Library Thursday mornings from 8am to 12noon. Additionally there are collaborative conferences with the Department of Radiology and the Trauma Service (Department of Surgery). Conferences are for divisional staff and fellows. Additionally, there are conferences oriented to housestaff and medical students, currently being held on Tuesdays 8am to 12noon.

1. The clinical conferences have subcategories of (1) case management, (2) procedures, (3) quality improvement and (4) "courses". Case management conferences follow the curriculum in pediatric emergency medicine which has been established by the Subboard in Pediatric Emergency Medicine (American Board of Pediatrics/American Board of Emergency Medicine). Using a case-oriented approach, common illnesses including asthma, seizures, testicular torsion and gynecologic, dental, ophthalmologic and orthopedic emergencies are discussed. Visiting faculty often provide these conferences. Procedures conferences are held once to twice monthly and provide non patient-based training in invasive procedures. Quality improvement conferences offer internal peer review of cases with unanticipated outcome. Finally, courses which are integral to the specialty of pediatric emergency medicine, that is Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS), Advanced Trauma Life Support (ATLS), Advanced Pediatric Life Support (APLS) and Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) are made available to all fellows and faculty.

2. The research conference series is the most extensive of the morning conferences. It has the subcategories of: (1) journal club, (2) biostatistical concepts, (3) computer orientation, (4) research in progress and (5) a fellow research course. Journal club follows the traditional model of a critical review of an article that is selected for relevance as well as methodologic/statistical issues worthy of discussion. The journal club article is selected with the assistance of the division Research Advisory Committee; articles are presented by the fellows. Biostatistical concepts is a recurring series of approximately 15 conferences which teach basic and advanced biostatistics. These lectures are provided by division faculty. Computer orientation introduces fellows to the computer software and hardware environment offered by the Division of Emergency Medicine. These conferences include introduction to the Mac and Windows environment, spreadsheets, statistical analyses, and data presentation. Research in progress lectures are given throughout the year by both fellows and faculty. Division members are given the opportunity to present their active research. Fellows are encouraged to present research that is in the conceptual phase but not yet underway. Faculty present ongoing research, in part as a means of identifying potential areas for collaboration with fellows. These conferences are scheduled by the Research Advisory Committee and serve to keep all members of the Division aware of ongoing divisional research. Finally, in July of each year, Children's Hospital offers a one-week clinical fellows research course for all new fellows. This intensive seminar provides lectures on biostatistics and research methodology so that fellows can have a foundation on which to build their research ideas as soon as they enter fellowship training.

4. Administrative conferences consist of (1) management issues, (2) computer orientation and, (3) staff meetings. Computer orientation conferences focus on use of the emergency department administrative system, including the new paperless charting system. Staff meetings are held regularly and consist of faculty meetings, faculty/fellow joint meetings and physician (fellow and faculty)/nurse meetings. At these meetings, issues of clinical care are discussed.

Division conferences provide 1 hour Category 2 continuing medical education units through the Harvard Medical School Department of Continuing Education.

Morning conferences are scheduled for the month and are available upon request.