POCUS – Computer-based Training for Improving the Quality of Ultrasonic Findings in Gallbladder Changes

Abstract

Point-of-care-ultrasound (POCUS) gains attention and is increasingly used in the medical community as it is applied by attending physicians. However, the lack of training in visual search in medicine put the success of POCUS at risk. The medical community requires standardized training. An attempt at that is shown in the presented study. Medical students (n = 14) who conducted an oral presentation as a passive learning method, followed by a computer-based training as an active learning method could increase their proportion of correct responses for ultrasound images of the gallbladder significantly compared to students who only conducted the passive learning method (n = 16) or no training at all (n = 16). Participants also mentioned their interest in an online training tool for their own universities. The successful application of POCUS would increase patient safety and lowers medical costs, but sufficient training is needed to fulfill these advantages. This paper contains 97’023 characters (incl. spaces, without appendices).