Perioperative Medicine in Action Course - UCL (University College London)

Explore perioperative medicine and how you can improve care for high-risk surgical patients. Join this RCoA endorsed course.

Make a difference: Improve patient outcomes with perioperative medicine

Too many patients die or suffer prolonged complications following surgery.

Perioperative medicine is an emerging, multi-disciplinary approach that seeks to optimise the care of high-risk surgical patients. It encompasses disciplines such as anaesthetics, surgery, nursing, elderly care, physiotherapy and healthcare management.

In this RCoA-endorsed course, developed by anaesthetists at University College London (UCL) Hospitals, you’ll learn the key concepts you need to improve patient safety and reduce healthcare costs.

Spanish translation available / traducción al español disponible.

When would you like to start?

Most FutureLearn courses run multiple times. Every run of a course has a set start date but you can join it and work through it after it starts.

• Date to be announced

Who is the course for?

This RCoA endorsed course is aimed at all interested healthcare professionals, both medical and allied health professionals. This would include anaesthetists, surgeons, care-of-the-elderly physicians, pre-assessment nurses, surgical ward nurses, operating department staff, physiotherapists and medical managers, emphasising that enhanced care and improved outcomes depend on a multidisciplinary approach.

Healthcare professionals might find the Certificate of Achievement for this course useful for providing evidence of Continuing Professional Development (CPD), or commitment to their career.

Although some of the statistics and guidelines are UK specific, the key concepts and learning aims are relevant at an international level.

This run of the course will include Spanish translation of course materials / el curso ofrecerá traducción al español.

Who will you learn with?

Abigail Whiteman

Abigail is a consultant in anaesthesia at University College Hospital, London and an honorary associate professor at UCL. Her main specialist interests are perioperative medicine and medical education

Katie Samuel

Katie is an Anaesthetic Consultant based in Bristol, UK.

Who developed the course?

UCL (University College London)

UCL was founded in 1826. It was the first English university established after Oxford and Cambridge, and the first to open up university education to those previously excluded from it.

What will you achieve

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to:

• Justify the need for better, more holistic care for the high-risk surgical patient, to improve outcomes and reduce healthcare costs.
• Engage with risk assessment tools to characterise and quantify the risk of an individual undergoing a particular procedure.
• Demonstrate the need for protocolised care pathways and evaluate the success of the enhanced recovery programmes in reducing variance in practice.
• Describe the major challenges in delivering perioperative medicine for the elderly.
• Discuss the current economic pressure on healthcare systems and how perioperative medicine can be used to reduce these pressures.