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Review
. 2023 Apr 19;15(1):19.
doi: 10.1186/s13089-023-00319-4.

Unravelling the skillset of point-of-care ultrasound: a systematic review

Tessa A Mulder  1 , Tim van de Velde  2 , Eveline Dokter  3 , Bas Boekestijn  3 , Tycho J Olgers  4 , Martijn P Bauer  5 , Beerend P Hierck  6   7   8
Affiliations
Review

Unravelling the skillset of point-of-care ultrasound: a systematic review

Tessa A Mulder et al. Ultrasound J. .

Abstract

Background: The increasing number of physicians that are trained in point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) warrants critical evaluation and improvement of current training methods. Performing POCUS is a complex task and it is unknown which (neuro)cognitive mechanisms are most important in competence development of this skill. This systematic review was conducted to identify determinants of POCUS competence development that can be used to optimize POCUS training.

Methods: PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, Emcare, PsycINFO and ERIC databases were searched for studies measuring ultrasound (US) skills and aptitude. The papers were divided into three categories: "Relevant knowledge", "Psychomotor ability" and 'Visuospatial ability'. The 'Relevant knowledge' category was further subdivided in 'image interpretation', 'technical aspects' and 'general cognitive abilities'. Visuospatial ability was subdivided in visuospatial subcategories based on the Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) Model of Intelligence v2.2, which includes visuospatial manipulation and visuospatial perception. Post-hoc, a meta-analysis was performed to calculate pooled correlations.

Results: 26 papers were selected for inclusion in the review. 15 reported on relevant knowledge with a pooled coefficient of determination of 0.26. Four papers reported on psychomotor abilities, one reported a significant relationship with POCUS competence. 13 papers reported on visuospatial abilities, the pooled coefficient of determination was 0.16.

Conclusion: There was a lot of heterogeneity in methods to assess possible determinants of POCUS competence and POCUS competence acquisition. This makes it difficult to draw strong conclusions on which determinants should be part of a framework to improve POCUS education. However, we identified two determinants of POCUS competence development: relevant knowledge and visuospatial ability. The content of relevant knowledge could not be retrieved in more depth. For visuospatial ability we used the CHC model as theoretical framework to analyze this skill. We could not point out psychomotor ability as a determinant of POCUS competence.

Keywords: Ability; Competence; Knowledge; Point-of-care-ultrasound; Psychomotor; Skill; Training; Visuospatial.

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Conflict of interest statement

There are no financial or non-financial competing interests for any of the authors to disclose.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Flow diagram of study selection
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Forest plot of the pooled correlations of the included studies divided by cognitive domain. R correlation coefficient. 95% CI 95% Confidence Interval. R2 determination coefficient. The pointed line represents the pooled correlation of the random effects model of all included studies, the grey box represents the weight of the studies. I2 fraction of variance due to heterogeneity. T2 the estimated standard deviation of underlying effects across the studies
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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