title: Telemedicine as a potential medium for teaching the advanced trauma life support (ATLS) course.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The advanced trauma life support (ATLS) course has become the international standard for teaching trauma resuscitation skills. The 2 to 2.5 days course is usually offered as an on-site teaching experience. The present project assesses the potential for applying telemedicine technology to teaching ATLS by distance learning.
  
  
  METHODS
  Two groups of equally trained first-year family practice residents were randomly assigned to a standard on-site ATLS course or one delivered by telemedicine. The 2 courses were compared by evaluating post-ATLS multiple-choice question test performance, instructor evaluation of student skill station performance, overall pass rate, participant rating of each component of the course, and overall feedback on the educational quality of the course (rating scale 1-4).
  
  
  RESULTS
  The mean scores for the 2 groups (with the standard ATLS and with the telemedicine, respectively) were not statistically significantly different: post-ATLS multiple-choice question-89.69% vs 85.89%; pass rate for the course was the same for both models; instructor overall evaluation of student skill station performance-3.12 vs 3.00; and participant overall feedback on all components of the course-3.67 vs 3.91.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results suggest that telemedicine technology could be successfully applied to teaching ATLS courses.
authors: Department of Surgery, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. alij@smh.ca
authors: Jameel
authors: J
authors: Ali
authors: Anne
authors: A
authors: Sorvari
authors: Sandrine
authors: S
authors: Camera
authors: Mark
authors: M
authors: Kinach
authors: Safraz
authors: S
authors: Mohammed
authors: Anand
authors: A
authors: Pandya
mesh_terms: D061906:Advanced Trauma Life Support Care; D002983:Clinical Competence; D004501:Education, Medical / Q000379:methods*; D017216:Telemedicine