Issue Four 2023 Editor's Pick

 

How Much Time Does It Take To Perform A Bedside Ultrasound?

 

I am delighted to share with you my Editor's Pick from the most recent issue of AEM E&T: Minutes matter: Time it takes to perform point-of-care ultrasound. I don't know about you, but as a leader in emergency medicine, I have heard from faculty and residents alike that they do not have enough time to perform a point-of-care ultrasound (PoCUS). My response in the past was that it does not take much time and the time spent can really help expedite care. I am very pleased to now be able to scientifically respond to my colleagues that the median time to perform a PoCUS in the emergency department is six minutes. 

Patrick et al., used time stamps from start of a study to completion of a study to measure the time it took to acquire ultrasound images. I don't think it is surprising that it takes longer for the more junior learners and less experienced sonographers to perform the studies. Like most clinical skills, learning ultrasound takes time, and efficiency is gained through experience. It is important to note that with increasing the speed at which a PoCUS was performed, the investigators did not find any degradation in accuracy.

The investigators were not able to delineate how much time it took based on specific ultrasound applications. This is an area that is ripe for further studies.

 

 

Susan B. Promes, MD, MBA

Editor-in-Chief