Teaching in emergency medicine

Abstract

The appropriate care of patients in emergency services can reach a level of complexity as to make a sound training necessary, which should be based on a medical speciality, as happens in the majority of the countries in our context. In Spain at present there is no regulated and homogeneous training in urgency and emergency medicine (UEM), either during the period of undergraduate training (in the form of a universally compulsory subject in the faculties of medicine) or during the postgraduate period (in the form of a medical speciality). In this respect, the definitive approval of the speciality in UEM is currently pending within the framework of a reform of the residence program that will evolve towards a core training program of specialities. Until thus occurs, the reality in Spain is that professionals who work in this care setting possess a heterogeneous training. As a result of this vacuum and the training needs of these professionals, a wide range of specific training proposals has been developed over the years in order to optimise the skills and abilities of the professionals who provide initial emergency care to the patient. A new generation of courses has been set underway using the new didactic methodologies of training, into which didactic tools of e-learning and robotic simulation have been incorporated.