Do Team Lead Experiences of Paramedic Students Influence Critical Thinking?

Introduction: Since 2013 EMS education has had substantial changes in laboratory and team lead requirements. Previous research demonstrated a positive correlation between the number of patient contacts and critical-thinking scores (CTS) on summative and certification exams. We investigated the relationship between team leads in the lab and CTS and the number of team leads in the field and CTS.

Methods: This study used retrospective data from Fisdap between 2014 and 2019. Data points included the number of field and lab patients and team leads. Students’ logit scores were correlated to total team leads and total patient encounters.

Results: A sample of 2,623 students from the 2014–2019 PRE4 administrations were evaluated. The average PRE4 CTS was 0.65 (SD=10). There was a positive correlation between field team leads and CTS (r=0.08, p<0.01) and lab team leads and CTS (r=0.09, p<0.01). Limitations include the timing of PRE4 exam and definition of “team leads” varying by program.

Setting    Total patient (average)    Team lead (average)
Field                   13 (SD=30)                 7 (SD=15)
Lab                     92 (SD=47.7)            73 (SD=43.4)

Conclusions: These results confirm previous findings that correlate team leads to improved critical thinking performance.