Conference Proceedings - School of Nursing & Midwifery - Trinity ...

School of Nursing & Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin: 8 th Annual Interdisciplinary Research Conference
Transforming Healthcare Through Research, Education & Technology: 7 th – 9 th November 2007
Conference Proceedings
so that groups of students move through a modular format that now
includes an interdisciplinary care conference and a critical incident
station. The revised design is described in Appendix 3.
Strategies to Ensure Success
Faculty members who are considering developing this type of
intermediate fidelity simulation event are encouraged to conduct at
least one rehearsal session prior to implementing the simulations
with students. The authors found that the rehearsal session was
beneficial as it allowed us to evaluate the amount of time to allot for
the simulation events, identify necessary equipment that may have
been inadvertently omitted, and to discern how to manage
participants who overplay or underplay their roles. The most
significant benefit of the simulation rehearsal was that it gave us
the opportunity to determine whether or not the simulation design
in fact lent itself to achieving the aforementioned goals.
Implications for the future
While additional nursing research is necessary to link simulation to
educational outcomes, it is evident that simulation can be used as a
strategy to develop and evaluate clinical competence. Moreover,
intermediate-fidelity simulation can be a powerful teaching tool
when an interdisciplinary approach is used and the complexity is
designed to challenge, but not overwhelm students. With the
exception of being personnel intensive, our team of cooperating
professionals believes that our simulations have few limits. In an
era of increased scrutiny regarding the safe delivery of care, this
experience offers an effective strategy for developing the skills and
abilities of all health care professionals.
References
Bradley, P. (2006). The history of simulation in medical education
and possible future directions. Medical education, 40(3), 254-262.
Bremner, M. N., Aduddell, K., Bennett, D. N., & VanGeest, J. B.
(2006). The use of human patient simulators: Best practices with
novice nursing students. Nurse Educator, 31, 170-174.
Comer, S. K. (2005). Patient care simulations: Role playing to
enhance clinical understanding. Nursing Education Perspectives, 26,
357-361.
Cooper, J. B., & Taqueti, V. R. (2004). A brief history of the
development of mannequin simulators for clinical education and
training. Quality & Safety in Health Care, 13, i11-8.
Schoening, A. M., Sittner, B. J., & Todd, M. J. (2006). Simulated
clinical experience: Nursing students' perceptions and the
educators' role. Nurse Educator, 31, 253-258.
Thurman, R.A. & Dunlap, R.D. (1999). Assessing the effectiveness
of simulator-based training.
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