SACME Virtual Journal Club April Session

Title: Assessment of outcomes of simulation education/training associated with team training and competencies beyond clinical skills training

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Presenter: Barbara Barnes, MD

Facilitator: Curt Olson, PhD

PDFs and/or active links to full articles will be provided to all registrants. 

There is increased interest in using simulation for training of healthcare professionals to function in new models of care and to address competencies beyond medical knowledge and clinical care. An AAMC study in 2011 demonstrated that 90% of medical schools used simulation to educate on communication skills and 90% to assess these skills. For teaching hospitals, this was 92% and 49% respectively. However, despite these findings there has not been a rigorous assessment of the relationship between performance in the simulated and actual environments. Barbara has selected the following recent articles to stimulate discussion on this topic.

- Curtis JR, et al. Effect of communication skills training for residents and nurse practitioners on quality of communication with patients with serious illness: a randomized trial. JAMA, 2013 December 4; 310(21):2271-81. doi: 10.1001/jama.2013.282081 Yardley, S., W Irvine, A. 

- Lefroy, J. (2013), Minding the gap between communication skills simulation and authentic experience. Medical Education, 47: 495–510.doi: 10.1111/medu.12146

Additional background for this topic comes from JCEHP Volume 32, Issue 4 which contains a number of interesting articles that address simulation specifically in the CE context. The article by Rosen et al provides a review of the literature on simulations that take place in the workplace (in situ). The second article by Curtis et al discusses the issue of fidelity in simulation and provides an interesting and sometimes counterintuitive perspective.