Children’s Health Foundation funds expansion of pediatric emergency training across Ontario

The London-based Paediatric Regional Outreach Program is bringing emergency simulation training to smaller Ontario hospitals. CTV’s Reta Ismail reports.

Children’s Health Foundation is supporting the expansion of a program designed to help health care professionals across Ontario prepare for some of the most critical medical emergencies involving children.

The Paediatric Regional Outreach Program (PROP), delivered through Children’s Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre, brings simulation-based training directly to community hospitals, helping frontline teams build confidence and skills in managing rare but serious pediatric emergencies.

Among the program’s training tools are high-tech simulators that can cry like a toddler, mimic breathing and even produce a pulse, creating realistic emergency scenarios for doctors, nurses and other health care providers.

Dr. Gurinder Sangha, a pediatric emergency physician at LHSC, compared the training to the simulation exercises routinely completed by airline pilots.

“Pilots always do simulation training for those rare events where you know there’s going to be an emergency. And of course, when we go to a plane, we take comfort in knowing that they are prepared. And so, we’re providing the same thing for care providers, and this program is allowing us to make sure we get to all of our regional partner sites,” Sangha explained.

In many smaller communities, critically ill children are rarely seen in emergency departments. While those cases may only occur a handful of times, staff must be prepared to respond immediately when they do.

“It would be a rare kind of we call it a high acuity, low opportunity event to have a really sick kid,” said Dr. Erica Cleto, an emergency department physician at Woodstock Hospital. “And so, the best way for us to be comfortable with this is rehearsal, and PROP has the ability to bring that rehearsal to us so that we can get the muscle memory and the comfort…that helps us to provide really high quality, seamless care when this is something we might only see once a year in some particular presentations.”

While clinical skills are a major focus, the program also emphasizes communication and teamwork during high-pressure situations.

“Really what it’s about is learning the teamwork and the crisis resource management skills,” said Sangha. “That’s really where a lot of this work is focus, because a lot of times we know what to do. But the question is, is that the hard part is actually doing it.”

The expanded program aims to reach 33 hospitals across Ontario, from southwestern Ontario to Thunder Bay, and train more than 1,100 health care professionals. The training is offered at no cost to participating hospitals.

For Cleto, the simulations help staff navigate not only complex medical emergencies but also the emotional challenges that can accompany caring for critically ill children.

“The simulation helps us to get that extra layer of comfort, so that we can manage like this really challenging cognitive event that’s really challenging, you know, medical event and challenging emotional event, and be professionals and deliver good care,” she said.

The simulators and training are funded through donor support from Children’s Health Foundation, helping expand access to pediatric emergency preparedness training for health care teams across the province.