Email

thomas.welch-horan@bcm.edu

Positions

Director of Simulation, Division of Emergency Medicine; Assistant Professor of Pediatrics

Pediatrics
Emergency Medicine
Baylor College of Medicine
Houston, TX US

Education

MD from Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons

05/2008 - New York, New York United States

Certifications

General Pediatrics

American Board of Pediatrics

Pediatric Emergency Medicine Subspecialty Board Certification

American Board of Pediatrics

Honors & Awards

Director of Simulation

Division of Emergency Medicine, Department of Pediatrics (07/2018)

Member, Education Subcommittee

CPR Committee, Texas Children's Hospital

Board Member, INSPIRE

Serve on Executive Board of the International Network for Simulation-based Pediatric Innovation, Research, & Education (INSPIRE). Chair Social Media Committee of INSPIRE.

International Network for Simulation-based Pediatric Innovation, Research, & Education (INSPIRE) (07/2021 - 07/2025)

Physician Lead, DISCERN-SQI clinical event debriefing initiative

CPR Committee, Texas Children's Hospital (05/2020)

Co-Chair, Process & Tools Subcommittee

Clinical Event Debriefing Taskforce, Texas Children's Hospital (08/2018 - 08/2019)

Co-Chair, CPR Committee

Lead the hospital-wide committee providing clinical guidance and quality improvement oversight for resuscitation at Texas Children's Hospital. The committee is part of the official hospital shared governance structure under the Medical Staff Services office, and the co-chair role has a three-year term.

Texas Children's Hospital (02/2025)

Selected Publications

• Servotte JC, Welch-Horan TB, Mullan P, Piazza J, Ghuysen A, Szyld D "Development and implementation of an end-of-shift clinical debriefing method for emergency departments during COVID-19." Adv Simul (Lond). 2020; Pubmed PMID: 33292850
• Welch-Horan TB, Lemke DS, Bastero P, et al. "Feedback, reflection and team learning for COVID-19: development of a novel clinical event debriefing tool." 2020 May 21;
• Zinns LE, Welch-Horan TB, Moore TA, Ades A, Wolfe HA, Mullan PC "Implementation of an Innovative, Multiunit, Postevent Debriefing Program in a Children's Hospital." Pediatr Emerg Care. 2019 Jul; Pubmed PMID: 31335786
• Boutis K, Cano S, Pecaric M, et al. "Interpretation difficulty of normal versus abnormal radiographs using a pediatric example." Can Med Educ J. 2016 Mar 31;7(1):e68-e77. Pubmed PMID: 27103955

Projects

Evolution of clinical event debriefs in a quaternary pediatric emergency department after utilization of a debriefing tool

Section of Emergency Medicine, Department of Pediatrics (09/2018 - 06/2021)

Qualitative research project to elucidate themes elicited during debriefing after resuscitations and other high-stakes events in a pediatric emergency department in the 6 years after implementation of a novel debriefing tool, with particular attention to the emergence of information around Crisis Resource Management.

DISCERN-SQI (Debriefing In Significant Clinical Events and Resuscitations Now for System-wide Quality Improvement)

Texas Children's Hospital Simulation Center and Sections of Emergency Medicine & Critical Care Medicine (05/2020 - present)

Co-lead QI/research effort, via the Education Subcommittee and Data Subcommittee of the hospital-wide CPR Committee, to build a process and an online tool that connects qualitative debriefing of resuscitations and other high-stakes clinical events to the systematic gathering of resuscitation data such as quantitative metrics of CPR quality.

DISCOVER-TooL for debriefing of COVID-19 events

Texas Children's Hospital Simulation Center & Emergency Center (03/2020 - 05/2021)

Implementation of "Debriefing In Suspected COVid-19 to Encourage Reflection & Team Learning" (DISCOVER-TooL). Quality improvement project implementing a clinical event debriefing tool to aid teamwork, organizational learning, and communication around care for patients with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 illness.

Memberships

International Network for Simulation-based Pediatric Innovation, Research, & Education (INSPIRE)

Executive Board Member

International Pediatric Simulation Society

(03/2015)

Society for Simulation in Healthcare

Healthcare Simulation Week 2020 Social Media Ambassador (2020) (01/2015)

Skills

Clinical Event Debriefing

Healthcare Simulation

Deliberate Practice for Achieving Expertise