Board 501- Technology Innovations Abstract Initial Experience With the Use of Virtual Simulation to Teach Students Interprofessional Education: The Charles R. Drew University (CDU) Experience (Submission #863)

Introduction/Background One of the leading causes of patient error is the breakdown in communication between healthcare professionals. The Institute of Medicine (IOM), Health Professions Education Report (2003) identified collaborative interdisciplinary learning as a core educational requirement and recommended, “To train in teams those who work in teams”. IPE is usually taught as a combination of didactic lectures and case scenarios. Challenges with Interprofessional Education (IPE) simulation are temporal, geographic, logistical, limited resources, difficulty in set-up of scenarios, and the need for students and facilitator to be physically present at the same location. For IPE, the use of the Virtual World to teach clinical and teamwork skills offer possibilities to overcome these challenges. Designed to run on personal computers, interactive virtual simulation platform using games technology, can be developed to captivate, engage and introduce learners to new knowledge or skills such as IPE. We therefore investigated the feasibility of using virtual simulation with multiple participants to teach IPE teamwork and communication. Methods Methods: Sixty CDU medical students (28 third years and 32 fourth years) participated in the study. Medical scenarios were created using the online simulation program CliniSpace (www.clinispace.com), which is a virtual simulation application that allows students and teachers to interact and practice medical scenarios. Students worked in pairs (one as a nurse and the other as a physician and then exchanged roles) and underwent a virtual session with the facilitator. Students logon to the session from home or any other place of their choice. Each virtual session included a medical crisis that the student pair had to respond to. The facilitator acted as the patient, creating a realistic simulation by presenting the students with challenges on how to treat the patient. After each session, students completed an assessment of their experience and problems with the virtual simulation using 22-question survey. The facilitator evaluated the students using a non-technical and cognitive skills 17-question survey. Each question is scored from 1 to 7 [1=poor and 7=excellent]. This tool assessed the students’ knowledge and demonstration of the standard of care, recognition of unstable patients based on vital signs, and their appreciation of when to ask for assistance from their peers. Results: The majority of the students positively evaluated the success of the five major areas of the simulation session: software installation [91%], navigation and item selection [93%], immersion [91%], content [90%], and usability [92%]. The overall team performance of the student pairs were rated as 72%. The demonstration of the knowledge of the standard of care was 66%. The performance related to teamwork and communication was 71%. However, 59% of the students had initial problems with the System. The major problem was with the use of the inbuilt voice module in the CliniSpace System. However, using the provided backup system, WebEx (www.webex.com), students were able to successfully participate in the virtual scenario. Results: Conclusion Our initial Results show that it is possible to teach IPE using Virtual Simulation. Problems encountered were related to the CliniSpace application, which is still under development. We expect that these issues would be successfully resolved. CliniSpace is web-based, and therefore requires a suitable equipped computer (Windows PC), with a sound and video card and a suitably fast Internet Connection. This might be a challenge for some students or locations. We hope to investigate this issue further. While Virtual Simulation seems in this case to compare favorably to mannequin /standardized patient’s simulation, it is important for further studies to compare student outcomes, to determine if Virtual Simulation can be used in place of simulation, or as an adjunct. Disclosures President and owner of CliniSpace.