Training junior doctors to lead rapid responses

Transitions during medical training are a significant source of stress, and junior doctors (residents) primarily learn new skills through on-the-job training. As residents transition from postgraduate year (PGY) 1 to 2, they take on new responsibilities, including the management of clinically unstable patients in rapid response (RR) scenarios.

In 2018, the internal medicine training programme at Brigham and Women's Hospital implemented a 'Transitions Retreat' to prepare PGY-1s for Year 2. In an informal survey, residents endorsed feeling underprepared to lead RRs. We designed a simulation-based curriculum to teach these skills. Participants completed a questionnaire pre-simulation and post-simulation exploring their perceived preparedness. Volunteer residents assessed performance on the simulation using skills checklists and led structured debriefing sessions. We audiotaped, transcribed and thematically analysed these sessions.

Forty-eight of 58 (82%) PGY-1s participated. Pre-intervention, 12.5% felt 'well-prepared' or 'very well-prepared' to lead RRs, compared with 33% post-intervention. Through qualitative analysis, we identified four key themes in our post-simulation debriefing conversations: (1) the chaos of RRs, (2) emotional reactions during RRs, (3) challenges and goals of task management and (4) value of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Though the majority of residents indicated that the curriculum enabled their preparedness to lead RRs and allowed them to process complex emotions in a safe space, we do not know how well this experience translates to the clinical setting. Therefore, we aim to collect follow-up data 6 months into the PGY-2 to explore residents' reflections on real-life experiences as well as whether the simulation impacted their preparedness to lead real-life RRs.