Physicians Performance After Night Shifts — URGENCE24  

Performance Clinical Trial

Official title: Performance of Emergency Physicians in the Management of Critical Situations Twenty-four Hours After the End of a Night Shift

Status Recruiting

Clinical Trial Summary

Emergency medicine is one of the professional activities integrating a night activity into working time. Concerns about the sleep deprivation that this activity generates have been growing for the past thirty years. However, at present, the pace - duration and repetition - of this activity does not yet seem to be optimized, and therefore continues to be the subject of questions in terms of safety of care and quality of life at work. One of the peculiarities of emergency medicine is that doctors have to work in a crisis situation. A situation is qualified as critical for a patient when his state of health is unstable, and with an evolution which can be rapidly pejorative. Crisis situations are at the heart of the emergency room profession, and due to their potential seriousness for the patients, it must be managed in all circumstances.

To cope with a crisis situation, a doctor needs to be efficient. However, performance calls for two types of skills: technical skills on one hand, and non-technical skills on the other.

This study therefore aims to answer the following question: are the non-technical skills of emergency physicians in the management of a crisis situation affected twenty-four hours after the end of a night shift? The study assesses the performance of emergency physicians via complex simulations at two time frames : 24h after a night shift (the post recovery performance simulation) and another time were the participant did not have night shifts in less than 3 nights (usual performance simulation).

Clinical Trial Description

The study compare the post-recovery performance (PRP) and the usual performance (UP) of emergency physicians in the management of a critical situation. The PRP corresponds to the performance twenty-four hours after the end of a minimum 12 hours night shift, which corresponds to the usual time when a physician go back to work. The UP is defined as the performance achieved in the absence of night shifts during the three previous nights.

Each participants realises 2 complex simulations, each simulation will focus on a trauma case involving difficult decision-making. Each simulation session lasts approximately thirty minutes. It includes a time to complete the questionnaires necessary for carrying out the study, before and / or after the simulated practice depending on the type of questionnaire, a brief interview on the simulation scenario, and the time for the simulated practice.The simulation environment of the study is as close as possible to a reception room for vital emergencies (SAUV), in order to be as close as possible to the usual professional environment of the participants.

During the simulated practice, a technician manages the progress of the scenario under the supervision of an emergency doctor controlling it. In the room, each participant is accompanied by two trained paramedics, whose roles will depend on the scenarios.

The performance is assessed via the Ottawa Crisis Resource Management Global Rating Scale (Ottawa GRS), questionnaires and an electrocardiogram (ECG). ;

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Performance

• NCT number: NCT05250089
• Study type: Interventional
• Source: University Hospital, Toulouse
• Contact: Charles-Henri HOUZE-CERFON, MD
• Phone: 05-61-77-21-47
• Email: houze-cerfon.ch@chu-toulouse.fr
• Status: Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: January 16, 2024
• Completion date: December 1, 2025