Senaryoya Dayalı Bir Sanal Hasta Programının Hekimlerin Diyabetik Ayak Enfeksiyonu ve Komplike İntraabdominal Enfeksiyon için Mevcut Kılavuzlara Uyumlarını Artırmaya Yönelik Kullanımı

Abstract

In the study it was aimed to evaluate diagnostic and practice patterns of physicians who participated for scenario-based virtual patient programs on complicated intra-abdominal infection (IAI) and diabetic foot infection (DFI). This study was conducted with 252 physicians who participated on a voluntary basis in two scenario-based virtual patient programs relating to complicated IAI (n=210) and DFI (n=42) which provide data on stepwise evaluation of patient (patient characteristics, disease characteristics, physical examination, laboratory and radiological findings) as requested by the physician and were developed using computer graphics technology. For IAI Case Scenario, the diagnosis was confirmed by 75.0% of physicians, while surgical intervention with ceftriaxone + metronidazole (37.6%) or with ertapenem (34.1%) was the most commonly selected treatment modalities. For DFI Case Scenario, the diagnosis was confirmed by 98.0% of physicians, and 71.0% of physicians considered initiation of antibiotic treatment and mostly with ertapenem (55.0%). In conclusion, our findings revealed that use of “scenario-based” virtual patient programs provided rapid and up-to-date feedback and self-monitoring of learning outcomes to improve clinical reasoning skills of physicians on IAI and DFI. Accordingly, our findings indicate practice pattern of physicians for complicated IAI should be improved in terms of more appropriate selection of empirical antibiotherapy, while diagnostic and practice patterns for DFI should also be improved in terms of more careful assessment of risk factors for infection and appropriate selection of empirical antibiotherapy.