Implementation of a Multimodal Knowledge-Exchange Platform to Provide Trauma Critical Care Education During the Ongoing Conflict in Ukraine

Abstract

The conflict in Ukraine has forced civilian hospitals with limited trauma and battlefield medicine experience to care for casualties of war, placing significant strain on the health care system. Using the Checklist for Early Recognition and Treatment of Acute Illness and Injury (CERTAIN) program, a multimodal trauma critical care knowledge-exchange platform was created for clinicians practicing in these institutions. To describe the development and implementation of the CERTAIN for Ukraine program and to evaluate the reach of this intervention, together with participant engagement and satisfaction. This quality improvement study included clinicians caring for critically ill patients during the ongoing Ukrainian conflict who were part of a community developed using a messaging app. The program was implemented by a group of international trauma and critical care experts in collaboration with critical care leaders from the Shupyk National Healthcare University in Kyiv, Ukraine. This study evaluates data collected from the CERTAIN for Ukraine program from its launch on April 9, 2022, to August 31, 2022. The initiative comprised a longitudinal series of interactive tele-education sessions, a webpage containing the CERTAIN approach and current trauma critical care guidelines translated into Ukrainian and Russian, and a private messaging chat for asynchronous discussion. Participant engagement and satisfaction were tracked using multimedia analytics and a post-session survey. Since program launch, 838 participants have joined the messaging group, and 6 tele-education sessions have been delivered, with 1835 total views. The CERTAIN website has had 3527 visits, mainly from Ukraine (1378 [39%]) and the United States (1060 [30%]). Of the 74 completed postsession surveys, 65 respondents (88%) rated the course content excellent or very good, and 73 (99%) recommended it to others. The findings of this quality improvement study indicate that, using widely available and low-cost platforms, knowledge was shared rapidly and efficiently to a large community of clinicians practicing in a wartime environment with broad-based engagement and a high level of learner satisfaction.