Point of Care Ultrasound Diagnosis of Deep Vein Thrombosis by Medical Students

Date

2022

Authors

Miller, Cassidy
Thompson, Sadie

ORCID

0000-0001-7565-2992 (Thompson, Sadie)

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Abstract

Deep venous thrombosis (DVT) is the most common type of venous thromboembolism. The feared complication of a DVT is the progression to a pulmonary embolism. Many DVTs can resolve spontaneously but screening and diagnosis are important for management to decrease progression to a pulmonary embolism and reduce the risk of morbidity and mortality. The purpose of this study was to determine if point-of-care ultrasound sonography by third-year medical students is sufficient in the diagnosis of a DVT. Students were trained on two point DVT screening using an in-person training session and an on-line training module. While on their family medicine rotations students obtained images of their screenings using a hand-held ultrasound and uploaded them to be graded. Studies will be deemed satisfactory if five out of six images obtained correctly identify the appropriate structures. The eleven students that participated completed a total of 110 studies. Of these studies a total of 97 studies were deemed satisfactory after expert review, for an overall study satisfaction of 88.18%. Of the eleven students, seven participants had 100% satisfaction in their studies, one had 90%, one had 80%, one had 70% and one had 40%. We conclude that students are able to obtain satisfactory images of the deep legs of the vein using point of care sonography after a 1 hour training session. All students except for one who participated were able to demonstrate competency from the study images that were obtained and reviewed. Third year medical students can be proficient enough with point-of-care ultrasound to screen for DVT. This has great application for rural medicine as well as these portable ultrasounds were sufficient enough to complete these screenings.

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