The Problem:
Did you know that up to 30 per cent of medical care is unnecessary in Canada?
Medical overuse costs the health care system millions of dollars and our patients unnecessary interventions resulting in adverse events.
This disproportionately impacts elderly patients.
The Solution:
Choosing Wisely Canada is the national voice in reducing unnecessary tests, treatments, and procedures in health care.
Family medicine residents can have a reduced comfort when treating older adults and therefore not practice optimal resource stewardship.
The Tool:
An instructional video can teach family medicine residents about the Canadian Geriatrics Society recommendations.
An example of a recommendation is to not use sedative-hypnotics for insomnia in the elderly.
The Goal:
The video module can help family medicine residents gain comfort with choosing wisely and ultimately become better clinicians when caring for older adults.
Canadian Geriatrics Society Choosing Wisely Canada Recommendations 
Hi Elliot!
I like how specific your problem is and I think it’s a great idea to use a set of recommendations already published.
Are you planning on short or long videos?
Can you expand a tiny bit more on why this affects the geriatric population more ?
LikeLike
Hi Carolyne,
I am thinking of creating a video with some background reading and multiple choice questions that could take 15 minutes or so to complete (but maybe only 5-10 minutes of actual video time). So this will be a medium length video.
Choosing wisely affects the geriatric population more because studies have shown that those who are elderly use more health care resources whether it be in the primary care, emergency, or inpatient setting. With more age, comes more co-morbidities, and therefore more investigations get ordered and interventions which can create cost to the system and potential harm to the patient.
See the attached study on education (specific to internal medicine residents residents) for the elderly:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5406113/
Also a Stat Can source for a Canadian perspective on health care resource utilization:
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/82-003-x/2017009/article/54855-eng.htm
I will expand on it in my actual video but didn’t feel I had the time to talk about the stats in my 60-90 second elevator pitch. Thanks for the great insight!
LikeLike
Hi Elliot,
I like your elevator pitch-the statistic really grabbed me at the beginning!
What do you think about moving the line ‘Family medicine residents can have a reduced comfort when treating older adults and therefore not practice optimal resource stewardship’ to the ‘problem’ section-as I think this is part of the problem you’re addressing?
I also wonder about linking back to the statistic in the ‘goal’ section-The video module can help family medicine residents gain comfort with choosing wisely…[and reduce the frequency of medical tests below 30%!]…or something like that?
Katie
LikeLike
Hi Katie. That is a good point. I will move that point up to the problem from the solution section. I will also consider linking back to the statistic in my end-goal section. Appreciate the suggestions!
LikeLike
Hi Elliot!
I like the pitch and think you did a great job at writing something captivating. However, I don’t think the pitch highlights WHY a video is necessary to teach residents the choosing wisely guidelines. For example, why can’t we just give residents a handout? Or do a lecture? I think the pitch will be much stronger once you include the reason for the tool!
Laura
LikeLike
You bring up a good point that I will need to highlight in my rationale. I am not sure if I will add it to the elevator pitch, but the purpose for having it as a video will be so I can create some easy-to-follow anecdotes and integrate some interactive multiple choice questions to better engage these residents. The reason why a lecture may not be as feasible is because the video is meant to be pre-work before the start of their geriatrics rotations to gain comfort in these concepts. I am not sure there is time to have everyone together in a lecture format as opposed to the ease of having the resident watch a ~10 minute video online the night before the rotation starts as a portion of the orientation package.
LikeLike