Transesophageal Echocardiography – Student Early Engagement in Didactic Sonography (TEE-SEEDS)

Transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) is an essential diagnostic tool for many cardiac pathologies. This study’s hypothesis is that a simulator-based TEE training method would improve the confidence, knowledge, and skills of medical students without prior TEE instruction, and that more experienced ultrasound students would benefit the most. In phase one, second-year and fourth-year medical students watched a TEE video before training and took pre- and post-training confidence surveys and knowledge quizzes. The training session was a live TEE simulator demonstration, after which participants’ ability to obtain four TEE views and identify major anatomical structures was tested. In phase two, a larger cohort of second-semester first-year medical students underwent the same training curriculum. The second- and fourth-year students’ knowledge scores significantly improved by 37.9% and 34.0%, respectively. The first-, second-, and fourth-year students significantly increased their confidence across all categories, including: cardiac anatomy (20.0%, 16.9%, 37.7%), general ultrasound (34.6%, 29.8%, 40.8%), cardiac ultrasound (51.1%, 47.6%, 65.0%), and TEE (252.9%, 400%, 446%). The greatest increase was seen in the fourth-year student cohort for TEE confidence, with a pre-intervention mean score of 1.3 (SD 0.49) and a post-intervention mean score of 7.1 (SD 1.21). All participants successfully demonstrated TEE skills. The data suggest that the tested TEE training protocol increases medical students’ TEE knowledge, confidence, and skills, demonstrating the benefits of implementing TEE training into medical curricula.