Abstract
IntroductionWe hypothesized that a geriatric chief complaint–based didactic curriculum would improve resident documentation of elderly patient care in the emergency department (ED).MethodsA geriatric chief complaint curriculum addressing the 3 most common chief complaints—abdominal pain, weakness, and falls—was developed and presented. A pre- and postcurriculum implementation chart review assessed resident documentation of the 5 components of geriatric ED care: 1) differential diagnosis/patient evaluation considering atypical presentations, 2) determination of baseline function, 3) chronic care facility/caregiver communication, 4) cognitive assessment, and 5) assessment of polypharmacy. A single reviewer assessed 5 pre- and 5 postimplementation charts for each of 18 residents included in the study. We calculated 95% confidence and determined that statistical significance was determined by a 2-tailed z test for 2 proportions, with statistical significance at 0.003 by Bonferroni correction.ResultsFor falls, resident documentation improved significantly for 1 of 5 measures. For abdominal pain, 2 of 5 components improved. For weakness, 3 of 5 components improved.ConclusionA geriatric chief complaint–based curriculum improved emergency medicine resident documentation for the care of elderly patients in the ED compared with a non–age-specific chief complaint–based curriculum.
Highlights
We hypothesized that a geriatric chief complaint–based didactic curriculum would improve resident documentation of elderly patient care in the emergency department (ED)
A geriatric chief complaint–based curriculum improved emergency medicine resident documentation for the care of elderly patients in the ED compared with a non–age-specific chief complaint–based curriculum. [West J Emerg Med. 2011;12(4):484–488.]
We hypothesized that a geriatric chief complaint–based didactic curriculum derived from a practice-based curriculum analysis would improve resident documentation of the medical care provided for elderly patients in the ED while optimizing the use of didactic time dedicated to geriatric emergency medicine (EM)
Summary
We hypothesized that a geriatric chief complaint–based didactic curriculum would improve resident documentation of elderly patient care in the emergency department (ED). Geriatric chief complaints may represent a high-yield curricular focus area, because geriatric patients account for 12% to 21% of all emergency department (ED) visits and 33% to 56% of hospital admission from the ED.[4,5,6,7].
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