The PECC project is an integrative system of personnel, resources, and online tools to improve prehospital care for pediatric patients. The PECC role will be filled by an existing leader in each EMS system and will utilize a variety of online tools to keep EMS providers informed on effective, evidence-based pediatric care. The PECC project also implements an online PECC hub that gives real-time feedback to providers that also generates feedback and suggestions based on their performance data.
The PAR project, or performance adherence reports, are performance feedback tools EMS workers can use to improve patient care for patients with time-sensitive critical illness or injury. PARs deliver individualized reporting to providers and compare a provider’s performance to providers in similar systems, their own system, and the state as a whole.
PARs come from an online web application that can be accessed by EMS providers and administrators 24/7. PAR data is obtained from individual providers that can be easily accessed by the provider or an administrator.
With only approximately 10% of EMS calls being for pediatric patients nationally, pediatric encounters are infrequent for most EMS providers. EMS systems often lack confidence and the necessary hands-on experience needed to maintain clinical skills. Focusing on just pediatric patients provides supplemental education to EMS providers that will in turn improve health outcomes in pediatric emergency care.
The PAR project provided eight North Carolina EMS systems with online educational courses and performance adherence reports for them to use however they chose. The PECC project is a continuation of the PAR project. The PECC project will build on the strengths of the PAR project by utilizing and expanding the educational courses and performance reports, while also tasking an individual leader within each system with championing pediatric performance improvement in their own county.
The PECC project aims to standardize the pediatric emergency care coordinator (PECC) job position and employ them in NC EMS Systems. The project also plans to deploy an online PECC hub that will allow PECCs access to Performance Adherence Reports (PARs), educational content for themselves and their EMS providers, and a data-driven alert system that will notify them of provider training interventions. Unlike, the PAR project, the PECC project focuses specifically on rural EMS systems in North Carolina.
Please see our Application & Eligibility tab for more details, or click here for the full application details on the NC OEMS page. If you have any additional eligibility questions after that, please reach out to jcyr@med.unc.edu.
PECCs will engage with the research team in yearly in-person training sessions that will involve pediatric simulation tools, guest speakers, and specialized pediatric training from experts in this field.
The PECC project is focusing specifically on rural EMS systems in North Carolina, which have been shown to have a more immediate need for robust pediatric care resources. We hope to use the PECC project to standardize the PECC role in a way that will be implementable by other systems in the future. We also plan to expand access to the educational courses and performance reports. If you have questions about your or your EMS system’s eligibility, please contact Julianne Cyr at jcyr@med.unc.edu.
We’re always happy to discuss this exciting project! Please reach out to Julianne Cyr at jcyr@med.unc.edu with further questions.