Intensive competency-based training strategy in a National Hospital in times of Pandemic

COVID-19 has revealed the lack of capacity to respond to a pandemic. This article aims to 1. Describe the training of healthcare workers from “Hospital Nacional El Salvador” using intensive training based on competencies and 2. Share the results of the course evaluation, hoping that this training methodology will be helpful to other countries. Given the large group of professionals to train (Physicians and Paramedics), a compact course based on competencies was designed and executed. In order to optimize instruction times and the need for assistance care, the course was scheduled for a total duration of 4 hours and was imparted by selected instructors from August 17 to 21, August 24 to 28, and September 7 to 11, 2020 (15 working days in total). The Research Ethics Committee of Hospital Nacional El Salvador approved the study. The effectiveness of the educational intervention was evaluated by a pre–post-survey of knowledge perception on 4 domains with 10 areas of skills in intensive care. 100% (n: 981) of the participants were trained in hands-on care of COVID-19 patients; 66.3% female–33.7% male, with an average age of 29.92 ± 5.82 years. The course achieved an increased perception of knowledge in the 10 areas evaluated with a mean of 5.72 ± 0.59 to 8.60 ± 0.19 (P < .0001). The short intensive training in competencies carried out at Hospital Nacional El Salvador proved to be effective in improving the knowledge of healthcare workers engaged in patient care.