Bedside Sonography in Emergency Departments in Turkey

Emergency departments in Turkey have been steadily improving their services since emergency medicine began as a specialty over 12 years ago, but bedside ultrasound (US) has not been implemented widely. In order to learn the extent of ultrasound usage and training opportunities, a 27-question survey was distributed to emergency medicine-trained physicians working in emergency departments at ten university hospitals (the busiest one in each geographical region, plus three others), which are referral centres covering over half of the country's population.Eight of the ten EM departments had an ultrasound machine in their ED (for a mean of 3·7 years), but the machines were used and controlled by the Department of EM in only four of the centres. While EM physicians knew how to perform US in seven centres, they routinely performed US themselves in only five. Of the 173 EM staff in the centres surveyed, 57 performed bedside US, and 28 possessed an US course certificate. All respondents wanted their EM residents t...