You will come to see the ups and downs that come with the life of “shift work.” While this allows you the flexibility to schedule your work around your family and social obligations (within reason, of course), it also creates its own challenges related to frequently changing sleep and meal schedules that can leave you more tired than you think it should.

As such, we have worked to provide many online learning opportunities, allowing you to master many of the course objectives at times that are convenient to you and to your personal schedule for the month. We have found that students feel this works much better for the “work-life” balance than frequent scheduled lecture time. Additionally, we have found that our medical students – who are adult, independent, and self-directed learners – appreciate these modules.

While it may seem like a lot at first glance, we hope that you will find (as your peers have found) that these are brief quizzes and assignments that complement your clinical time. You should also know that we have reduced your required number of shifts for the rotation to allow you sufficient time to complete these requirements along the way.

As always, please feel free to reach out to Dr. Dyer (Stroger) or Dr. Alcorn (Rush) for any questions or concerns throughout your rotation.

Clerkship Objective Online Didactic
1. Patient Care How to Approach the ER Patient
Critical Thinking in the ED
2. Communication Presentations in the ED
CDEM: Consultations in the ED
3. Professionalism Professionalism
4. Wound Care CDEM Wound Closure Module
+ Suture Lab Performance
5. Read an EKG M4 EKG
EKG 101
6. Airway CDEM Airway Module
Airway Procedures
+ Sim Lab Performance
7. Breathing Respiratory Distress and Ventilator Settings
+ Sim Lab Performance
8. Circulation Pulseless arrest
+ Sim Lab Performance
ACLS Algorithm (Cyclical)
ACLS Algorithm (Flowchart)
9. Toxicology Toxicology Module
10. Trauma Trauma
CDEM Trauma Module
+ Sim Lab Performance
Additional Topics
Practice Questions Participation

Other useful online resources

Here is a curated list of podcasts and videos that match with the topics you’ll be covering in the ER.

TOPIC RESOURCES
Diagnostic Reasoning in the ER St. Emlyn’s: Diagnosis 1
St. Emlyn’s: Diagnosis 2
St. Emlyn’s: Diagnosis 3
Ruben Strayer’s Emergency Thinking ← Really like this one
Circulation RP: Shock
Chest Pain St. Emlyn’s: Chest Pain
Shortness of Breath St. Emlyn’s: SOB
Headache St. Emlyn’s: Headache
How to call a consult St. Emlyn’s: Referrals
Dr. Sherman’s County Lectures vimeo website, ask Dr. Dyer for the password