Background: The number of Emergency Department (ED) visits by patients over age 65 is increasing rapidly. Common chief complaints, such as abdominal pain, often are associated with atypical presentations and significant morbidity and mortality. Hence, it is important for Emergency Medicine (EM) physicians to have both a high suspicion for disease and an in-depth knowledge base when treating these patients. However, the unique presentations of disease in older patients are rarely focused on during EM residency training. The authors created an innovative, interactive small group activity with five cases of older patients presenting to the ED, focusing on fundamental disease processes and presentations, for training EM residents.

Methods: EM residents are divided into teams and challenged to provide the most efficient, cost-effective care in five cases. Using play money, the residents are given limited funds to perform specific exam components and order laboratory studies and imaging. After teams complete the cases, a debriefing is performed in a large group to discuss learning points, highlighting diagnoses and treatments specific to geriatric patients. This activity was developed for EM residents but has since been adapted for use with medical students and residents and faculty from other specialties, including Internal Medicine and Surgery.

Results: EM residents were very receptive to this exercise. On evaluations, they appreciated the interactive learning and case-based teaching. On a scale from 1-5, with 5 being the highest score, residents rated the overall quality of the session and teaching effectiveness as 4.6 and 4.3, respectively. Comments included: “awesome case format” and “very clinically applicable”.

Conclusions: A case-based, interactive small group exercise is an innovative way to educate EM residents about emergencies and atypical presentations in geriatric patients. These cases also can be adapted for residents in other specialties as well as for faculty and medical students.