The field of healthcare simulation continues to make tremendous strides to revolutionize healthcare education through clinical simulation research being conducted across the globe. Multiple peer-reviewed journals now focus on clinical simulation research. This HealthySimulation.com article by Content Manager Teresa Gore, PhD, DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, CHSE-A, FSSH, FAAN, provides an overview of some of the latest clinical simulation highlights as of early November 2024.
Effectiveness of Interprofessional Development of Foundational Lactation Open Education Resources: The purpose of this manuscript is to share the interprofessional development of foundational lactation open education resources (OERs) for prebriefing prior to simulation. A team of health faculty, students, and practitioners developed five lactation modules with an Equity Diversity Inclusion (EDI) framework representing diverse families. Participants (n=1453) answered a survey at the end of the OER modules including a variety of healthcare professional faculty, students, practitioners, and parents. The process of development, effectiveness, and usability of these modules were used for prebriefing prior to teaching/learning opportunities. The findings from use of the five OERs provide descriptive data on the usefulness for interprofessional education and professional development. The creation of five OER lactation modules provide an equity and inclusion lens to model consistent approaches to support the needs of diverse families allowing interprofessional students to develop shared mental models and psychological safety prior to clinical experiences.
Use of Simulation During COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review: Some experts have made suggestions on how to use simulation during the pandemic, and simulation activities were carried out observing COVID-19 restrictions to improve technical and non-technical skills in health professionals. A number of papers have been published detailing the use of simulation during this period, but it is not clear for this reason, through a retrospective literature review, we analyzed studies published during the pandemic period to assess how simulation was used during this historical period.
A retrospective literature review. The search generated 11,375 records. After removing duplicates, 5431 studies were screened. Of the 643 eligible full-texts, 221 were excluded. A total of 422 articles met the inclusion criteria. Half of the 422 included studies were carried out specifically for COVID-19 (211), while 152 (36%) were performed during the pandemic but for other reasons. Analysis showed that simulation was used during the pandemic, with clear educational and research objectives. Most of the included studies dealt with COVID-19, focusing on high-acuity and critical scenarios but also including technical and non-technical skills. The experience gained with both “COVID-related” and “During COVID” studies could be applied to other settings in case of urgent training needed in case of disasters and to tailor simulation courses to retain technical skills.
Bridging Nursing Professional Development and Healthcare Simulation Standards of Best Practice: Both the faculty shortage and limited clinical placement opportunities for students impact the use of simulation in nursing programs. Despite widespread use, many nursing faculty do not have training in simulation best practices and have limited skills and confidence in the use of simulation. As part of a Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board Grant, a Simulation Series was developed for nurse educators and graduate nurse educator students with the objective of increasing knowledge, confidence and skill as a nurse educator utilizing simulation as a teaching strategy. The series was developed based on the Healthcare Simulation Standards of Best Practice™. The education was designed to be a four-part Simulation Series combining both in person and virtual components. Completion of the series provided 20 contact hours of Nursing Professional Development (NPD).
Twelve participants completed all 4 modules in the series, limiting the generalizability of the data. However, data suggest an overall improvement in knowledge, confidence, and skills. Development of clinically and technologically relevant simulation education based on set standards can challenge nurse educators. Nursing professional development can be a tool to close the knowledge, skills, and practice gap.
Evolution of Simulation Scholarship: A Text Mining Exploration: Text mining uses advanced machine learning algorithms, natural language processing, and statistical analyses to unveil hidden themes in a body of text. Reviewing the simulation literature though text mining allows researchers to categorize extensive collections of publications and develop salient questions based on mapping the evolution of simulation scholarship.
This review examined manuscripts in five healthcare simulation journals between 2006 and 2022, resulting in 2,382 articles included in the text corpus. The top 20 topics were identified and named, in addition to which topics had the highest number of publications. Finally, publication patterns for each topic were examined, with several hypotheses offered as explanation of the results. Practical implications of text mining include tracking publication shifts over time, as well as identifying areas of future research that warrant more in-depth, contextual analyses.
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Speech recognition technology for assessing team debriefing communication and interaction patterns: An algorithmic toolkit for healthcare simulation educators: Debriefings are central to effective learning in simulation-based medical education. However, educators often face challenges when conducting debriefings, which are further compounded by the lack of empirically derived knowledge on optimal debriefing processes. The goal of this study was to explore the technical feasibility of audio-based speaker diarization for automatically, objectively, and reliably measuring debriefing interaction patterns among debriefers and participants. Additionally, it aimed to investigate the ability to automatically create statistical analyses and visualizations, such as sociograms, solely from the audio recordings of debriefings among debriefers and participants.
We used a microphone to record the audio of debriefings conducted during simulation-based team training with third-year medical students. The debriefings were led by two healthcare simulation instructors. We processed the recorded audio file using speaker diarization machine learning algorithms and validated the results manually to showcase its accuracy. We selected two debriefings to compare the speaker diarization results between different sessions, aiming to demonstrate similarities and differences in interaction patterns.
Ten debriefings were analyzed, each lasting about 30 min. After data processing, the recorded data enabled speaker diarization, which in turn facilitated the automatic creation of visualized interaction patterns, such as sociograms. The findings and data visualizations demonstrated the technical feasibility of implementing audio-based visualizations of interaction patterns, with an average accuracy of 97.78%. We further analyzed two different debriefing cases to uncover similarities and differences between the sessions. By quantifying the response rate from participants, we were able to determine and quantify the level of interaction patterns triggered by instructors in each debriefing session. In one session, the debriefers triggered 28% of the feedback from students, while in the other session, this percentage increased to 36%.
A Competency Framework for Simulation Facilitation in Low-Resource Settings: A Modified Delphi Study: We aimed to develop a core competency framework for healthcare simulation facilitation in low-resource settings using a modified Delphi process. We drew on the domain expertise of members of the Vital Anaesthesia Simulation Training Community of Practice, with the study guided by a four-member steering group experienced in the conduct of simulation in low-resource settings. In survey round 1, participants (n = 54) were presented with an initial competency set derived from a previous qualitative study and co-created a set of 57 competencies for effective simulation facilitation in low-resource settings. In survey round 2, participants (n = 52) ranked competencies by relevance into three performance categories: techniques; artistry; and values. In survey round 3, participants (n = 50) ranked competencies on their importance. The steering group collated results and presented a draft core competency framework. In survey round 4, participants (n = 50) voted with 98% agreement that this framework represented the most relevant and important competencies for effective facilitation of simulation sessions in low-resource settings.
The final 32-item framework encompasses core competencies found in existing standards and includes important new concepts such as demonstration of cultural sensitivity; humility; ability to recognise and respond to potential language barriers; facilitation team collaboration; awareness of logistics; and contingency planning. This competency-based framework highlights specific practices required for effective simulation facilitation in low-resource settings. Further work is required to refine and validate this tool to train simulation facilitators to deliver effective training to improve patient safety.
