09/19/2014
EM Residency Spotlight
Mercy St. Vincent Medical Center
Mercy St. Vincent Medical Center’s EM residency, led by Dr. Randy King, continues its educational mission with over a hundred rotating medical students annually. The students are stewarded by a dedicated senior class of residents who have scheduled teaching time in their curriculum, allowing for weekly simulation lab sessions (led by faculty, Drs. Sara Graber and Mike McCrea) and bi-monthly live tissue procedure labs. Students are also offered separate courses in Wilderness Medicine, Emergency Medicine research, and an advanced EM elective is being developed by the senior residents to start this year.
The Midwest MedWAR (pictured left), driven by Dr. Mike Omori, is now in its 13th year. This seven-hour adventure race sponsored by the residency uses simulation to teach wilderness medicine and attracts teams from across the Midwest to compete.
The ultrasound program, led by Drs. Mohammad Moussa and John Russ has become more formalized with dedicated scanning days in the department and a strong basic lecture series allowing any interested resident to receive their RDMS certification prior to graduation.
Dr. Daniel Schwerin leads EMS education with one of the few air ambulance services in the country that uses physicians (our upper level residents) as part of the regular crew. Last year Mercy St. Vincent residents flew over 470 flights. The program recently held its EMS day giving residents a chance to interact with the Toledo EMS services.
Despite the clinical load, the program, led by research director Dr. Mike Plewa, presented seven projects at the SAEM Midwest Regional conference and two at the National ACEP Scientific Assembly, and several papers from the residency will be published in journals this year. Dr. Scott McMaster, a recent graduate, who has since moved to New Zealand, will have his residency research project on fish hook removal published this fall. Dr. Tom Kopp, one of Mercy St. Vincent’s chief residents traveled to the Chicago-Mackinaw sailboat race to gather data for the largest study to date on freshwater sailing injuries. The resident so far this year with the best elective is Dr. Damien Berry who travelled to Haiti on a mission project (pictured right).
With an energetic group of residents, experienced seniors, and eager interns, Mercy St. Vincent Medical Center is looking ahead to both unexpected challenges and deliberate steps forward as innovators in emergency medicine education.