About

What We Do

What We Do

We address a need for evidence-informed, easily accessible, and practical resources that meet the information needs and preferences of both families and emergency healthcare providers.

Evidence Based Resources

In 2013, TREKK completed a national needs assessment to learn about the information needs and preferences of healthcare providers and parents in general emergency departments from across Canada.

We used the results to develop a series of evidence-based tools for pediatric emergency care. Read below to find out more about how they can help you in your clinical practice.

For Healthcare Professionals

Evidence Repositories are collections of best available resources and evidence collated by a knowledge synthesis expert at Alberta Research Centre for Health Evidence (ARCHE) and the clinical content team.  A pyramid-shaped framework, built upon the “4S” hierarchy of evidence model, is used to provide detailed evidence appropriate to stakeholders’ needs.  We search a combination of databases and web-based search engines to locate evidence for the knowledge pyramids. For each topic the knowledge synthesis expert collaborates with clinical content advisors to select the most relevant guidelines, reviews, and key studies to create the topic Evidence Repository.

Bottom Line Recommendations (BLRs) are short summaries of the latest knowledge related to the diagnosis and management of pediatric emergency conditions. They can be used to manage acutely ill and injured children in the emergency department or for educational and professional development purposes.

Algorithms are a step-by-step guide for managing critically ill children. They guide decisions about care, including specific treatment plans. These decisions, which might be unclear based solely on the available evidence, are made in consultation with our pediatric content advisors, ensuring a consensus-based approach.

For Parents and Families

Parent tools are designed with parents to provide evidence-based health information to help them care for their sick children at home, and to aid them in understanding when to seek medical care. These tools merge evidence, storytelling and art to share high quality health information in engaging ways. They also make a great resource for healthcare providers to share with families in waiting rooms and at healthcare visits.

Our Process

Our Research

About our Research

We work with Pediatric Emergency Research Canada (PERC) and other organizations to mobilize the latest evidence in children’s emergency care.

Part of this work includes providing knowledge translation and communications support with research projects.

Research Roadmap

Completed

Needs Assessment

Our national needs assessment, led by Dr. Shannon Scott, surveyed more than 1,400 general ED clinicians and 1000 parents across Canada, resulting in the largest known knowledge needs assessment of emergency care in Canada. TREKK coordinators from 12 pediatric hospitals visited 32 general ED sites (rural, remote and urban) to collect survey data. Seven focus groups with ED healthcare professionals discussed the survey findings in more detail. An in-person data collection strategy was purposefully designed to help build strong relationships between the general EDs and pediatric hospitals, which have been critical for effective knowledge mobilization. In total, 58 health care professionals participated in the qualitative needs assessment across two urban, three rural, and two remote sites. The findings have been fundamental in identifying priority topics and methods to develop resources and share evidence. To learn more: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28067181/ and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27358205

Completed

Social Network Analysis

In 2016, a qualitative social network analysis helped us gain a more in-depth understanding of the network processes and context. Semi-structured interviews with 22 general emergency department (ED) healthcare professionals highlighted the use of resources, outreach education sessions, and talking to colleagues in pediatric EDs as common sources of information for both nurses and physicians, and suggested that the priorities and investments of TREKK were in line with their information needs and that TREKK resources and processes are being used as regional benchmarks across a number of EDs. As network connections strengthened, healthcare professionals not only felt an increased level of comfort to seek out clinical advice from pediatric EDs but also commonly shared knowledge gained through these encounters with colleagues in their local ED, amplifying the sharing of knowledge. To learn more: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/canadian-journal-of-emergency-medicine/article/knowledge-sharing-between-general-and-pediatric-emergency-departments-connections-barriers-and-opportunities/612915FBF891653ADEE2A14947BFF331

Active

Manitoba Métis Federation

We are proud to partner with the Manitoba Métis Federation on a project to support Red River Métis families’ access to meaningful and appropriate materials when seeking emergency care for their children. We have spoken with Red River Métis parents and Elders in Manitoba to learn about their child health information needs and preferences. Together, we will be adapting some of our existing parent tools to better meet their needs.

More information can be found in our scoping review, published in BMJ Open.

Our findings will also inform the CIHR-funded Cultural Adaptations Methods Working Group (led by Drs. Sarah Elliot, Lisa Hartling and Shannon Scott at the University of Alberta).

Active

POPCORN – Pediatric Outcome imProvement through COordination of Research Networks

POPCORN brings together researchers, clinicians, decision-makers, and patient partners to form a pan-Canadian pediatric research network and answer important questions in child health.

We are proud to be part of POPCORN and lead its knowledge mobilization (KM) pillar. The KM pillar works in collaboration with the patient engagement team, knowledge users (e.g. Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC)), project leads, and coordinating centre (Maternal Infant Child and Youth Research Network (MICYRN)) to establish a network that can respond rapidly to health emergencies and pandemics. We are developing a communications plan to connect researchers and knowledge users (patient partners and decision-makers) to identify research priorities, establish research questions, interpret results, and share study findings.

While created in response to COVID-19, the platform will provide the infrastructure to prepare for future pandemics. For more information, please contact POPCORN

Collaborate with TREKK

Work with experts in the fields of pediatrics and child health, we work to expand our Evidence Repository based on the needs of general emergency departments.