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Understanding the Eligibility and Process for Taking PALS Renewal Certification Classes

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PALS is short for Pediatric Advanced Life Support. The PALS course is mandatory for healthcare providers responding to emergencies in children and infants. The course is also essential for health care personnel working in intensive care and critical care units, emergency medicine, and emergency response.

Eligibility for PALS Course

The PALS course is designed for people working in the medical field responsible for providing emergency care to infants and children.  It offers an excellent career path to healthcare professionals like paramedics, nurses, physicians, emergency medicine providers, and first responders.

If you are enrolling for a PALS renewal course, your current PALS card must be valid. If the PALS card has expired, you have to retake the complete PALS course.

The Validity of PALS Certification

You need to renew your PALS certification every two years.  The renewal of PALS certification is crucial to stay updated regarding advances in pediatric resuscitation science.

What Does the PALS Course Teach?

The PALS course prepares healthcare personnel to improve their outcomes for pediatric patients. The course imparts high-quality individual skills. Upon completing the course, you will be able to recognize and intervene in patients with cardiopulmonary arrest, shock, and respiratory emergencies using high-performance team dynamics.

The course module includes different cardio emergency scenario practices with simulations. It helps reinforce crucial treatment concepts in the student.  After completing all patient cases, the student must pass a multiple-choice exam with a minimum score of 84%.

What Are the Content and Modules in the Course?

The course modules’ content is as follows.

  • Identifying cardiopulmonary arrest at early stages and applying CPR
  • Identify patients who do not need immediate intervention
  • It helps identify the difference between respiratory failure and distress
  • High-quality Infant CPR and Child CPR AED.

Two Modes of Delivery of PALS Course

The two delivery modes of the PALS course are – Classroom PALS and Blended Learning Heartcode PALS.

The Blended Learning mode includes online learning followed by hands-on skills sessions.  The program uses a customized adaptive learning algorithm that puts the student on the path of PALS mastery.  The learning path is customized as per the student’s inputs.   Their self-reported confidence and performance of each probe are considered while offering personalized learning in the following modules.

The course content is designed for self-directed learning, cognitive assessment activities, and probes.  The student can complete an in-hospital or pre-hospital contextualized track.

After students complete the online session, they must attend the instructor-led session with a structured set of activities. The instructor focuses on team scenarios, debriefing, meaningful skills practice, skills testing, debriefing, and local protocols discussion.

Due to the adaptive learning format, the time for completing PALS renewal can differ for each student.  In most cases, the HeartCode PALS session is completed in 5 hours with a break.

Classroom PALS

Unlike the Blended learning option, the classroom PALS course is delivered entirely in the classroom by an instructor(s).  In Classroom PALS, the ratio of students to instructor is 6:1.  The Traditional  Full PALS course is completed within 17 hours and 15 minutes with breaks. The Full PALS course is completed within 12.5 hours with a break, and the PALS Update course is completed within 8 hours, 45 minutes, with breaks.

How To Renew PALS Certification?

You need to choose an AHA accredited organization that enrolls students for a PALS certification course. You need to meet the PALS course’s eligibility requirements and have an old PALS certificate that needs to be renewed. You will be asked to provide personal details, phone numbers, and email addresses while enrolling for the course.

The next step involves choosing an instructor-led classroom location that is near you or convenient for you. You are expected to reach the classroom on time, and only 15 minutes of late-coming is acceptable. If you are not able to attend a scheduled classroom, you can cancel and reschedule. The reschedule option is only offered twice.

What Is CEU?

CEU stands for continuing education credits. The renewal of PAL certification is offered under the continuing education credits policy of AHA. As per the educational strategies of AHA, the health sector should examine and adopt best practices in medicine and resuscitation. When the best practices in resuscitation are applied, the survival rate of cardiac arrest is improved. Also, the quality of care is improved through renewal courses.

To sum up, the PALS course imparts life-saving techniques to healthcare professionals. Technology is continuously improving, which has led to the refinement of several medical practices for better outcomes.  If you are a PALS certified professional, you should enroll in the renewal course before expiring your current PALS card to avoid inconvenience.