Administration
The emergency physician's expertise must often extend beyond the clinical arena. Thus, another goal of the training program is to prepare residents to play leadership roles in emergency department administration and in the planning and management of EMS systems and other health care-related programs.
Each year, a two-part management course for third year emergency medicine residents is taught by Emergency Medicine faculty. This course introduces the senior resident to the skills required for emergency department leadership. Residents develop an understanding of how the emergency department functions within an individual institution while learning the essential elements in managing an emergency medicine practice.
Clinical Training
The first year of training provides a solid foundation, including 7.5 months of emergency department experience. First year residents also receive training in areas such as critical care and trauma. A dedicated "triple threat" month combines experiences in anesthesia, OB, and ultrasound. Finally, a month-long series of core education and skills workshops in September of the first year provides a comprehensive introduction to the body of knowledge and skills the emergency physician must master.
In the second and third years, the focus is more exclusively on the delivery of emergency medical care in both prehospital and hospital settings. There is increased time spent in the emergency department and increased involvement in all aspects of prehospital care. In the strong teaching environment of the residency hospitals, supervised experience and bedside teaching enable the resident to develop procedural skills, critical thinking and clinical judgment and to master the application of medical knowledge in the clinical setting. Second and third year residents provide medical command for prehospital care personnel and fly as crew members for STAT MedEvac, the largest single operated and dispatched air-medical transport system in the United States. STAT MedEvac operates eighteen helicopter base sites in Pennsylvania and surrounding states. Second and third year residents also staff a dedicated EMS response vehicle, providing online and in-person medical command to Pittsburgh EMS.
- PGY-1 Rotations
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- Emergency Medicine (UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy, UPMC Magee-Womens)
- Pediatric Emergency Medicine (UPMC Children's)
- Core Didactic Month
- Intensive Care (UPMC Mercy)
- Trauma (UPMC Presbyterian)
- Triple Threat - Anesthesia, Obstetrics, Ultrasound (UPMC Mercy, UPMC Magee-Womens)
- PGY-2 Rotations
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- Emergency Medicine (UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy)
- Pediatric Emergency Medicine (UPMC Children's)
- Toxicology (UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Children's)
- Prehospital Care
- Triple Threat - Pediatric Anesthesia, Pediatric Orthopedics, Ophthalmology, Ultrasound (UPMC Children's, UPMC Presbyterian)
- Intensive Care (UPMC Shadyside)
- Trauma (UPMC Mercy)
- PGY-3 Rotations
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- Emergency Medicine (UPMC Presbyterian, UPMC Shadyside, UPMC Mercy)
- Pediatric Emergency Medicine (UPMC Children's)
- Trauma (UPMC Presbyterian)
- Prehospital Care
- Community (St. Clair Hospital)
- Elective
Learn more about our Clinical Sites
Research
Creation of new knowledge through research is one part of the core mission of the Department of Emergency Medicine. Our investigative program is truly translational in character. By virtue of overlapping interests from faculty with expertise in both basic and clinical investigation, ideas, technology and treatments can be tested at the bench and in patients. Observations in patients can be examined in mechanistic detail at the bench. Finally, specific findings can be translated into policy and protocols at a local, state and national level.
We partner with multiple other specialties and departments within the University to study the acute and emergency care of many different diseases. Clinical decision making, treatment of prolonged cardiac arrest, acute care for trauma patients, and alternative care pathways are specific topics of interest to individual faculty members. We have special concern for the health and safety of emergency providers. Specific efforts are devoted to identifying threats to provider health, deterrents of occupational longevity, and work environment factors that might decrease patient safety. Recent work attempts to reduce risky behaviors and substance use that lead to a need for emergency care. Finally, we study the optimal ways to teach and train providers to perform emergency care, as well as ways to quantify procedural skill.
Our core resources include our clinical sites and laboratories, though we venture regularly into the intensive care units and outpatient setting. Out-of-hospital emergency care is studied with our paramedic and first responder partners throughout Pennsylvania. Dedicated laboratories include a complete human physiology laboratory, a biochemistry wet-lab, and an animal surgical laboratory. Experienced staff members support these research sites.
Teaching
Emergency Medicine residents have extensive opportunities to serve as educators, in the clinical setting of the Emergency Department, in the prehospital realm, and in the classroom and simulation setting for students at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and for paramedic students and all level of prehospital provider throughout the region. Residents are provided with a Resident as Teacher course as part of their training. Starting in the second year, residents are partnered with medical students during select shifts in the ED across several hospital sites, allowing them to mentor students and perfect their bedside teaching style. Many residents opt to gain additional teaching experience and even to design their own educational curricula and materials.
All residents are involved in the educational programs sponsored by the Center for Emergency Medicine.
- Resident Teaching Opportunities
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- Advanced Cardiac Life Support provider courses
- Advanced Trauma Life Support courses
- Basic Trauma Life Support courses
- Pediatric Advanced Life Support courses
- Continuing medical education series for practicing emergency physicians
- Emergency medicine electives and clerkships for first-, third-, and fourth-year medical students from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
- Paramedic training courses
- Refresher courses for EMTs and paramedics
- Lectures to emergency and allied health care personnel in residency hospitals and in the southwest Pennsylvania region
- Several didactic, or small group, presentations at our conferences throughout the three years of training
- Pitboss role during the PGY 3 year at UPMC Mercy Hospital