Paediatric Trauma and Emergency Medicine

Toy ambulance

Dates to be confirmed (Online)
Live online sessions: dates tbc

Course details

  • Duration:  5 weeks
  • Live online sessions: tbc
  • Fees: £495
  • Venue: Online
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This short course covers common acute emergency and trauma presentations across infancy and childhood, with a particular focus on the early detection of sick children. You will learn how to synthesise clinical findings and rationalise choices of investigations and management.

We will focus on critical thinking and evidence-based decision making in acute care, rather than learning clinical guidelines. We will also cover how the approach to research and quality improvement differs in the acute setting, including learning the process of formulating a research question and designing a study. 

Topics covered will include:

  • Resuscitation
  • Recognition of common acute presentations to the emergency department
  • Focus on probabilities, including pre-test probabilities and likelihood ratios of tests/clinical signs.
  • Management of common acute presentations to the emergency department
  • Holistic assessment of the child and family to appropriately focus investigation and management; this may include social and psychological aspects
  • Epidemiology of Injury
  • Focus on common injury presentations
  • Evaluation of less common presentations such as Brief Resolved Unexpected Events (BRUEs) and syncope

The course is part of a range of short courses spread throughout the academic year which are available both to students who are enrolled on the MSc Applied Paediatrics course and as stand-alone CPD accredited programmes for all healthcare professionals.

More information

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, you will be able to:

  1. Formulate an approach to the recognition of a sick or seriously injured child, in particular the measurement and interpretation of vital signs and the use and validation of early warning scores.
  2. Justify differential diagnoses, appropriate investigations and evidence-based initial management for common, undifferentiated acute clinical presentations in children. 
  3. Critically appraise the approach to research and quality and improvement in an acute paediatric setting.
  4. Critically evaluate the unique ethical aspects in an acute paediatric setting

Course structure & delivery

The course runs online over 5 consecutive weeks, and you are expected to conduct approximately 7 to 10 hours of self-directed study per week, depending on your pace of learning. This consists of weekly directed tasks that you can undertake at your own pace and timing, such as watching recorded lectures, assigned reading or reflection and forum work, but also may consist of group work online. There are also planned synchronous online sessions (one per week) during the course to discuss ideas, present group, and individual work and to facilitate further learning.

Evidence of sufficient participation will be required to obtain a course certificate.

Live online sessions

The course consists of several synchronous sessions on a video-conferencing platform - times tbc:

Who should attend?

Who should attend?
This course will benefit paediatricians, GPs, nurses, therapists, and other healthcare professionals involved in Child Health.

As the course is a multi-professional programme, students will develop an understanding of how their own individual behaviours, and those of the teams within which they work, can have a significant influence on the quality of care delivered.

Optional assessment

This course is not formally assessed for short course students.

However, feedback will be provided for any submitted activities such as participation and contribution to group work and interactive sessions including a workshop within the course.

Optional assessment
Participants have the option of completing an assessment component and on completion will be provided with an official Imperial College London transcript of results. Credits accrued (within two years of transcript date) can be utilised towards the PG Certificate in 'Applied Paediatrics', should they wish to undertake further study with Imperial College.

Details of the assessment and deadline for submission will be given during the course. Please note that there is an additional assessment fee payable in full prior to submission date. Please contact us for further information.

Module leaders