Virtual Agents Based Simulation for Training Healthcare Workers in Hand Hygiene Procedures

The goal of our work is the design and implementation of a virtual agents based interactive simulation for teaching and training healthcare workers in hand hygiene protocols. The interactive training simulation features a virtual instructor who teaches the trainee the Five Moments of hand hygiene, recommended by the Centers of Disease Control and the World Health Organization, via instructions and demonstrations in a tutorial phase. In an interactive training phase, a virtual health care worker demonstrates by interacting with a virtual patient and the patient's environment in ten randomly generated virtual scenarios. After watching each scenario the trainee evaluates if the virtual healthcare worker's actions are in accordance with the Five Moments of Hand Hygiene procedure. In a feedback phase, the trainee receives feedback on their performance in the training phase after which the trainee can either exit or return to any phase of the interactive simulation. We describe the design and development of the hospital environment, simulated virtual instructor, health care worker and patient, and the interactive simulation components towards teaching and training in healthcare best practices associated with hand hygiene.

[1]  Randall W. Hill,et al.  Pedagogically Structured Game-Based Training: Development of the Elect BiLAT Simulation , 2006 .

[2]  B. Allegranzi,et al.  The World Health Organization Guidelines on Hand Hygiene in Health Care and Their Consensus Recommendations , 2009, Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology.

[3]  James C. Lester,et al.  Animated Pedagogical Agents: Face-to-Face Interaction in Interactive Learning Environments , 2000 .

[4]  Randall W. Hill,et al.  Virtual Humans in the Mission Rehearsal Exercise System , 2003, Künstliche Intell..

[5]  Sabarish V. Babu,et al.  Can Immersive Virtual Humans Teach Social Conversational Protocols? , 2007, 2007 IEEE Virtual Reality Conference.

[6]  Stéphane Hugonnet,et al.  Reduction of Health Care–Associated Infection Risk in Neonates by Successful Hand Hygiene Promotion , 2007, Pediatrics.

[7]  Justine Cassell,et al.  Embodied conversational interface agents , 2000, CACM.

[8]  S. Hugonnet,et al.  Effectiveness of a hospital-wide programme to improve compliance with hand hygiene , 2000, The Lancet.

[9]  Todd Dorman,et al.  Effectiveness of continuing medical education. , 2007, Evidence report/technology assessment.

[10]  Ana Paiva,et al.  Making It Up as You Go Along - Improvising Stories for Pedagogical Purposes , 2006, IVA.

[11]  Leslie Homsted,et al.  Guidelines for hand hygiene in healthcare settings. , 2009, The Florida nurse.

[12]  Tony Mullen.  Mastering Blender , 2009 .

[13]  Didier Pittet,et al.  Guideline for Hand Hygiene in Health-Care Settings Recommendations of the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee and the HICPAC / SHEA / APIC / IDSA Hand Hygiene Task Force , 2002 .

[14]  Thomas Bernard,et al.  Interpersonal Scenarios: Virtual \approx Real? , 2006, IEEE Virtual Reality Conference (VR 2006).

[15]  Kyle Johnsen,et al.  Experiences in using immersive virtual characters to educate medical communication skills , 2005, IEEE Proceedings. VR 2005. Virtual Reality, 2005..

[16]  Tony Mullen.  Introducing Character Animation with Blender , 2007 .

[17]  John M Boyce,et al.  Hand hygiene compliance monitoring: current perspectives from the USA. , 2008, The Journal of hospital infection.

[18]  J. Richardus,et al.  Systematic Review of Studies on Compliance with Hand Hygiene Guidelines in Hospital Care , 2010, Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology.

[19]  Thomas D. Parsons,et al.  Virtual Human Patients for Training of Clinical Interview and Communication Skills , 2008 .

[20]  Didier Pittet,et al.  Guideline for Hand Hygiene in Health-Care Settings. Recommendations of the Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee and the HIPAC/SHEA/APIC/IDSA Hand Hygiene Task Force. , 2002, American journal of infection control.

[21]  Chris Barker,et al.  An Experiment on Public Speaking Anxiety in Response to Three Different Types of Virtual Audience , 2002, Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments.

[22]  W. Jarvis,et al.  Selected Aspects of the Socioeconomic Impact of Nosocomial Infections: Morbidity, Mortality, Cost, and Prevention , 1996, Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology.