A national survey of pediatric residents and delivery room training experience

Abstract

Objective: To investigate current delivery room training experience in US pediatric residency programs and the relationship between volume of delivery room training and confidence in neonatal resuscitation skills.

Study design: Links to a web-based survey were sent to pediatric residency programs and distributed to residents. The survey concerned delivery room attendance during training and comfort level in leading neonatal resuscitation for various scenarios. Comfort level was rated on a 1 to 9 scale. Mixed models accounted for residency programs as random effects.

Results: For PL-3s, the mean number of deliveries attended was 60 (standard deviation, 43), ranging from 13 to 143 deliveries for individual residency programs. Residents' confidence level in leading neonatal resuscitation was higher when attending more deliveries, with 90.3% of those attending>48 deliveries having average score 5 or greater vs 51.5% of those attending<21 deliveries. Higher attendance also correlated with confidence in endotracheal intubation and umbilical line placement.

Conclusions: Wide variability existed within and among residency programs in number of deliveries attended. Volume of experience correlated with confidence in leading neonatal resuscitation and related procedural skills.