DKOU 2015: DGOU and Lufthansa Flight Training launch a new course format for doctors

In emergency situations, both doctors and pilots have to make important decisions quickly – despite being under stress and time pressure. Human factors play a decisive role in these situations in both aviation and medicine. “Lufthansa’s security training programme is a good model from which medicine can learn some valuable lessons,” says Prof. Reinhard Hoffmann, Deputy Secretary-General of the DGOU and Secretary-General of the German Trauma Society (DGU). Safety checklists for surgery – similar to those that exist in aviation – and the Critical Incident Reporting System (CIRS) have already become tried-and-tested tools for improving patient safety. 

A recent survey of 800 society members carried out by the DGOU Young Forum shows where the roots of incidents in orthopaedics and trauma surgery predominantly lie: 80 percent of respondents cited time pressure, 70 percent poor communication, 67 percent staff shortages, and 62 percent stress. 

The new IC course format aims to provide strategies that will help avoid such causes of error and further improve patient safety. For roughly a year, orthopaedic and trauma surgeons have been working with LFT trainers to hone the concept, which focuses largely on human factors. “The training course should help us to develop new communication structures,” explained trainer Prof. Bertil Bouillon to the 16 participants attending the first day of the IC course, which took place on 11 and 12 September at the Lufthansa Training & Conference Centre Seeheim close to Frankfurt. Dr Bouillon, who is Director of the Department of Trauma Surgery, Orthopedics and Sports Traumatology in Cologne, believes it is important to standardise interpersonal competence in the same way that specialist knowledge is standardised – particularly for emergency situations.

Following this first course, there are to be three more modules, aimed at the entire range of professional levels – from junior doctor to head physician. At the conference on 20 October 2015, DGOU and Lufthansa Flight Training staff involved in the project will report on their initial experiences of the pilot programme and explain how the new training format is to be implemented in the future.