BackgroundEmergency Medicine (EM) is increasingly becoming an international field. The number of fellowships in International EM in the USA is growing along with opportunities to complete international health electives (IHEs) during residency training. The impact on host institutions, however, has not been adequately investigated. The objective of this study is to assess the experience of several South American hospitals hosting foreign EM residents completing IHEs.MethodsAnonymous, semi-structured one-on-one interviews were conducted with physicians working in Emergency Departments in three hospitals in Lima, Peru and one hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina. All participants reported previously working with EM foreign rotators. Interviews were analyzed qualitatively and coded for common themes.ResultsThree department chairs, six residents, and 15 attending physicians were interviewed (total = 24). After qualitative analysis of interviews, two broad theme categories emerged: Benefits and Challenges. Most commonly reported benefits were knowledge sharing about emergency medical systems (78%), medical knowledge transfer (58%), and long-term relationship formation (42%). Top challenges included rotator Spanish language proficiency (70%) lack of reciprocity (58%), and level of training and rotation length (25%). Spanish proficiency related directly to how involved rotators became in patient care (e.g., taking a history, participating in rounds) but was not completely prohibitive, as a majority of physicians interviewed felt comfortable speaking in English. Lack of reciprocity refers to the difficulty of sending host physicians abroad as well as failed attempts at building long-lasting relationships with foreign institutions. Lastly, 25% preferred rotators to stay for at least 1 month and rotate in the last year of EM residency. This latter preference increased knowledge transfer from rotator to host.ConclusionsOur research identified benefits and challenges of IHEs in Emergency Medicine from the perspective of physician hosts in several hospitals in South America. Our results suggest that IHEs function best when EM residents rotate later in residency training and when relationships are maintained and deepened among those involved including host physicians, rotators, and institutions. This leads to future rotators, project collaboration, research, and publications which not only benefit individuals involved but also the wider field of Emergency Medicine.

Background: The goals of intertrochanteric hip fracture (IHF) treatment are stable fixation, early mobilisation and function restoration. If the attempt to reduce, stabilise and fracture healing utilising a femoral cephalomedullar nail (CMN) fails, options for subsequent attempts are limited. Purpose: Evaluate the clinical and radiographic outcomes of conversion total hip arthroplasty (THA) using a modular stem following a CMN failure. Materials and methods: We retrospectively reviewed a consecutive series of patients with an IHF between 2012 and 2014 to identify CMN patients that went on to the subsequent failure and conversion to THA utilising a modular femoral stem (MFS). In all cases, MP Reconstruction Prosthesis (Waldemar Link, Hamburg, Germany) was implanted. Primary clinical outcomes were assessed using Harris Hip Score (HSS) before conversion procedure, 3 months, 6 months and recent office visit post-conversion THA thereafter. The secondary outcome was to analyse intra and postoperative complications. Serial radiographs at each follow-up interval were assessed for clinical success or to confirm adverse events. Results: 28 patients were included in the study; 17 were females. The average age was 72.7 years (SD ± 10.5); the average time from the index procedure to conversion THA was 12.6 months (SD ± 3.5). At baseline, average HHS was 42.1 (SD ± 3.6), improved to 80.7 (SD ± 5.1) at 3 months, 86.0 (SD ± 3.9) at 6-months which levelled off to 86.1 (SD ± 4.0) at final follow-up. There were 4 (14%) post-conversion complications: 2 dislocations, 1 superficial wound infection, 1 patient with symptomatic abductor deficiency. All 4 cases were conservatively treated successfully, the implants were retained, and the patients progressed without further issue. Conclusions: MFSs allow to successfully treat failed CMN and adverse variations in femoral anatomy with a device that will permit simultaneous correction of leg length, offset and version to relieve pain, restore function and create a durable prosthetic to host composite.

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