A75Strengthening simulation quality assurance through the ‘Sim QA bundle’

Introduction:This abstract presents a comprehensive overview of our organisation’s journey towards re-accreditation with the Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare (ASPiH), the UK’s national simulation accrediting body. Following initial accreditation in March 2021, several recommendations were made, necessitating a thorough evaluation of specific areas of our simulation education practices. The primary focus was on addressing identified needs, ensuring alignment with accreditation standards, and fostering continuous improvement in simulation-based education [1].Methods:Over the intervening three-year period, we reviewed the ASPiH recommendations and gradually revised our simulation education practice, encompassing updates to our programme evaluation, faculty training, and stakeholder engagement. Working with the original standards, in tandem with the updated standards, we wanted to work in a progressive way, matching to both the original and current 2023 standards [2]. Every staff member within the organisation was involved and led on a dedicated area of improvement, with regular standards update action planning sessions, consulting stakeholders, simulated patients and patient groups. We worked with a three-year Gantt chart, watching our progress in a visual manner.Results:Through diligent efforts, significant progress has been made in enhancing simulation education practices. A comprehensive summary can be found in table 1, but these are key take-aways: Peer reviews are undertaken at regular intervals ensuring educator competence in the debriefing process, addressing the recommendations of Standard 3. Regular programme and faculty evaluations are conducted to maintain content relevance, meeting the requirements of Standard 8. Formal policies have been established to address faculty responsibilities for patient safety and learner performance concerns, as per Standard 11, and robust documentation for quality assurance has been developed, aligning with Standard 21, Table 1-A36.Recommendation from 2021 accreditation and responses for 2024 re-accreditationDiscussion:By addressing the recommendations outlined by ASPiH in 2021, we have strengthened our simulation education practices, ensuring alignment with accreditation standards and organisational goals. Accreditation and re-accreditation with ASPiH serve as a catalyst for organisational growth, fostering a culture of excellence and innovation in simulation education [3]. By embracing recommendations and driving continuous improvement initiatives, our organisation remains at the forefront of advancing simulation-based healthcare education, ultimately enhancing patient outcomes and healthcare delivery. From this position, we feel able to support other organisations as they work towards initial or re-accreditation, aligning with the new standards.Ethics statement:Authors confirm that all relevant ethical standards for research conduct and dissemination have been met. The submitting author confirms that relevant ethical approval was granted, if applicable.

There is widespread enthusiasm and emerging evidence of the efficacy of simulation-based education (SBE) but the full potential of SBE has not been explored. The Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare (ASPiH) is a not-for-profit membership association with members from healthcare, education and patient safety background. ASPiH's National Simulation Development Project in 2012 identified the lack of standardisation in the approach to SBE with failure to adopt best practice in design and delivery of SBE programmes. ASPiH created a standards project team in 2015 to address this need. The article describes the iterative process modelled on implementation science framework, spread over six stages and 2 years that resulted in the creation of the standards. The consultation process supported by Health Education England resulted in a unique document that was driven by front line providers while also having strong foundations in evidence base. The final ASPiH document consisting of 21 standards for SBE has been extensively mapped to regulatory and professional bodies in the UK and abroad ensuring that the document is relevant to a wide healthcare audience. Underpinning the standards is a detailed guidance document that summarises the key literature evidence to support the standard statements. It is envisaged the standards will be widely used by the simulation community for quality assurance and improving the standard of SBE delivered.

This year sees the 10th anniversary of the Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare (ASPiH, www.aspih.org.uk), and close collaboration with the Irish Association of Simulation (IAS) and the Northern Ireland...

As ASPiH (Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare) celebrates its 15th anniversary at this year's conference, there is an opportunity to reflect on how simulation in healthcare has changed.Although simulation in healthcare has been around for centuries [1], it is really only in the past few decades that we have seen its legitimacy, integration into healthcare and education, and purposes become more established [2].Recent growth has been exponential and with that has come further insights and opportunities to shape, refine and advance simulation in all its forms for the benefit of all.This year's ASPiH conference theme is that of Transformative Simulation [3,4].The theme reflects not only a distinct purpose for simulation but also acknowledges how simulation has transformed over time.We are commonly used to seeing healthcare simulation used as a tool for education but more and more we are seeing the benefits of simulation as 'a tool to transform health and care through collective understanding, insight and learning ' [3,5].This distinct purpose offers many opportunities to transform healthcare -even disruptively -rather than replicating existent practices.However, without recognition of this distinction, advances are slow and confusion can persist.Simulation designed for education serves a fundamentally different purpose to simulation aimed at eliciting insights and knowledge to drive transformational changes.That becomes strikingly evident when designing simulations for these very different purposes.For example, educational simulation requires pre-determined learning outcomes [6], whereas transformative simulation requires broad objectives that enable

BackgroundPrior to the Covid-19 pandemic, fourth year medical students on paediatric placement attended a simulation teaching session where groups of three to four students rotated around eight stations with two...

To describe the American Academy on Communication in Healthcare's (AACH) Faculty Development Course on Teaching the Medical Interview and report a single year's outcomes. We delivered a Faculty Development course on Teaching the Medical Interview whose theme was relationship-centered care to a national and international audience in 1999. Participants completed a retrospective pre-post assessment of their perceived confidence in performing interview, clinical, teaching, and self-awareness skills. A total of 79 participants in the 17th annual AACH national faculty development course at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in June 1999. A 5-day course utilized the principles of learner-centered learning to teach a national and international cohort of medical school faculty about teaching the medical interview. The course fostered individualized, self-directed learning for participants, under the guidance of AACH faculty. Teaching methods included a plenary session, small groups, workshops, and project groups all designed to aid in the achievement of individual learning goals. Course outcomes of retrospective self-assessed confidence in interview, clinical, teaching, self-awareness, and control variables were measured using a 7-point Likert scale. Participants reported improved confidence in interview, clinical, teaching, and self-awareness variables. After controlling for desirability bias as measured by control variables, only teaching and self-awareness mean change scores were statistically significant (p < .001). The AACH Faculty Development course on Teaching the Medical Interview utilized learner-centered teaching methods important to insure learning with experienced course participants. Perceived teaching and self-awareness skills changed the most when compared to other skills.

The Clinical Skills and Simulation Centre (CSSC) at Edge Hill University (EHU) was opened in September 2019 to enhance and standardize simulation-based education across all programmes in the Faculty of Health, Social Care and Medicine. Before the CSSC opened, academic staff had not received any formal guidance in using simulation-based education. With the impact of the pandemic, a three-step blended simulation faculty development approach was created to assist and support faculty in their understanding and in the delivery of simulation The aim of the study was to enhance, encourage and standardize the use of simulation-based education through the delivery of a three-step faculty development programme.The following are the three-step approach to faculty development: The introduction of simulation sessions is specifically designed and focussed on the newly appointed academic faculty and is embedded in the staff induction programme.Writing simulation scenarios, drop-in sessions are run once a month and are available to all academics from the faculty. They focus on designing and writing simulation scenarios.Shadowing and feedback. At this stage, faculty are offered support during their simulation session. The experienced simulation facilitator leads the first part of the event with the faculty member running the second part supported by the facilitator observing and providing feedback after the session.The evaluative methods included two approaches, quantitative incorporating Likert questionnaires, for evaluations, and qualitative focus groups, for faculty. Approximately 1700 student and faculty evaluations were obtained, and seven faculty members participated in the focus groups. These were obtained and conducted between June 2020 and August 2021.Evaluations are obtained from students and from faculty who are involved in the sessions. In addition, ethical approval has been obtained to carry out focus groups to identify the challenges and benefits that faculty have found in delivering simulation. Feedback from the evaluations and the focus groups were very positive. Examples include:The simulation team have been extremely supportive and always are. It makes my role so much easier and I appreciate all their hard work.We had 450 students over a fortnight, everyone worked so hard and were very supportive, especially to staff who had not facilitated simulation for some time.Data from June 2020 to August 2021The session: Was beneficial for my learning, 87.74%Archived the learning outcomes, 91.37%Did the session meet your expectations? 87.32%We will continue to offer a blended approach and, from August 2021, a 1-day simulation facilitation programme will be offered to potential adjunct clinical faculty.

Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Medicine, Lubbock.

The application of simulation as an educational tool within medicine is increasing. In immersive simulation, it is widely accepted that the post-scenario debrief is a critical component for learning.1 Effective...

Structure: Who should attend; Level (please select from Introductory/Intermediate/Advanced) Background, Intended Learning Outcomes, Structure of workshop Educational Methods to be used.The application of simulation as an educational tool within medicine...

BackgroundThe use of simulation-based education (SBE) in health professions, such as physical therapy, requires faculty to expand their teaching practice and development. The impact of this teaching on the individual faculty member, and how their teaching process changes or develops, is not fully understood. The purpose of this study was to explore individual physical therapist faculty members’ experience with SBE and how those experiences may have transformed their teaching practice to answer the research questions: How do physical therapist faculty develop through including SBE and are there commonalities among educators?MethodsAn interpretive phenomenological analysis approach was used with a small sample of subjects who participated in three individual semi-structured interviews. Interview questions were created through the lens of transformative learning theory to allow faculty transformations to be uncovered. A two-step thematic coding process was conducted across participants to identify commonalities of faculty experiences with SBE in physical therapist education. Credibility and trustworthiness were achieved through member checking and expert external review. Thematic findings were validated with transcript excerpts and research field notes.ResultsEight physical therapist faculty members (25% male) with a range of 3 to 16 years of incorporating SBE shared their individual experiences. Four common themes related to faculty development were identified across the participants. Themes identified are the following: faculty strengthen their professional identity as physical therapists, faculty are affected by their introduction and training with simulation, faculty develop their interprofessional education through SBE, and faculty experiences with SBE facilitate professional growth.ConclusionPhysical therapist educators had similarities in their experiences with SBE that transformed their teaching practice and professional development. This study provides insight into what physical therapist faculty may experience when adopting SBE.

As we strive to educate the future nursing workforce, the discipline of nursing is obligated to reexamine how we prepare nurse educators. Nurse educators today must reach contemporary learners and transition them into a professional role that navigates a very complex and diverse health care system. We can no longer afford to move along our current, outdated teaching trajectory with nursing students, regardless of where they are on their educational journeys. Many educators, concerned with the state of the nursing profession and higher education, have long focused on improving their teaching. For more than a decade, we have identified the role of the nurse educator as guide by the side, as opposed to sage on the stage. Now, we say that our mission is to teach learners to think like a nurse. However, some still find it difficult to stray too far from PowerPoint outlines that replicate what is already in textbooks. Lectures and PowerPoint outlines do have value in specific limited circumstances, but the outcomes are often merely content delivery. Various teaching strategies, such as gaming, have been interjected into teaching practices as approaches to engage students and enable learning. However, learning outcomes and practice performance are not where they need to be in terms of competence, and educators are often at a loss to explain why students do not understand concepts, despite their efforts at trying new teaching approaches. Teaching that only delivers content will not sustain long-term learning. Our health care systems are undeniably too complex for the mere memorization of content. Nurses must use content and be able to provide rationales for the actions they take, driven by how content is interpreted in the context of the care situation. With our current emphasis on concept-based curricula and competency-based education, the preparation and development of educators to move beyond teaching facts is paramount. It is the role of the educator to provide multiple opportunities for learners to rehearse the use of content within context and discuss their thinking and rationales. Unfortunately, we are leaving nurse educators behind in the shift from delivering content to using content. There continue to be policies recommending that preparation as an educator be an add-on to the nurse’s advanced degree(s). We suggest that our educators are expert clinicians but are not automatically expert teachers, and they need pedagogical preparation and ongoing professional development. There is evidence to support this. We must shift our perspective to one with a focus on educator preparation, or faculty will continue to teach the way they were taught, and students will continue to focus on memorizing surface content and struggle to think like a nurse. There is a plethora of literature on the challenges expert clinicians face in the transition to academia. Mentoring and orientation programs designed for new faculty often include content on teaching theory, strategies, learner assessment, scholarship, and service, with specific educator preparation strategies for acquiring pedagogical content knowledge (Crider, 2022). However, there is limited description on how these programs/workshops are delivered to educators. Pedagogical knowledge and content are important, but developing nurse educators who can teach learners how to use nursing knowledge requires more than the delivery of content. Like nursing students, educators must also be given multiple opportunities to use their pedagogical content knowledge. Educators must experience learning and move from a lens of teaching to a lens of learning. In a recent article, “Faculty as Learner: Neuroscience in Action” (Patterson & Forneris, in press), we report on a qualitative descriptive study with 16 participants who completed a 10-week intensive faculty development course with a focus on contemporary teaching grounded in neuroscience principles. The intensive course was intentionally designed for participants to experience neuroscience concepts and strategies (i.e., metacognition, desirable difficulty, and retrieval practices) while engaged in learning about them. As faculty learners, focused on learning the content of neuroscience concepts, participants experienced an important shift in how they understood their role. The study findings 1) support the need to prepare educators to use brain-based teaching strategies in the classroom and 2) highlight how faculty can reframe the teaching-learning process and move away from a sole focus on content delivery. It is imperative that faculty development efforts be reexamined; simply providing pedagogical content is not sufficient. The nurse educator competency in the pursuit of continuous quality improvement in the nurse educator role acknowledges the value of lifelong learning. Faculty development must be intentional, with a clear commitment to faculty across their professional careers (Young-Brice et al., 2022). Investment in the preparation and development of nurse educators, both financial and in time, is the ethically right approach for all constituents: educators, administrators, students, and the global community.

To examine the impact of social networks and a two-day faculty development course on clinical supervisors' adoption of an educational innovation. During 2007-2010, 571 residents and 613 clinical supervisors in four specialties in the Netherlands were invited to complete a Web-based questionnaire. Residents rated their clinical supervisors' adoption of an educational innovation, the use of structured and constructive (S&C) feedback. Clinical supervisors self-assessed their adoption of this innovation and rated their communication intensity with other clinical supervisors in their department. For each supervisor, a centrality score was calculated, representing the extent to which the supervisor was connected to departmental colleagues. The authors analyzed the effects of supervisor centrality and participation in a two-day Teach-the-Teacher course on the degree of innovation adoption using hierarchical linear modeling, adjusting for age, gender, and attitude toward the S&C feedback innovation. Respondents included 370 (60%) supervisors and 357 (63%) residents. Although Teach-the-Teacher course participation (n=172; 46.5%) was significantly related to supervisors' self-assessments of adoption (P=.001), it had no effect on residents' assessments of supervisors' adoption (P=.371). Supervisor centrality was significantly related to innovation adoption in both residents' assessments (P=.023) and supervisors' self-assessments (P=.024). A clinical supervisor's social network may be as important as faculty development course participation in determining whether the supervisor adopts an educational innovation. Faculty development initiatives should use faculty members' social networks to improve the adoption of educational innovations and help build and maintain communities of practice.

As Accessible as a Book on a Library Shelf: The Imperative of Routine Simulation in Modern Health Care

Introduction:The Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare has identified the importance of resource management in team training to improve clinical performance, to develop culture, and educational governance within a safe and supportive learning environment [1]. Simulation has been successfully used as a quality and risk management resource to test new medical facilities for safer patient care.Methods:The scenarios were designed to last for approximately thirty minutes. The debrief was approximately one hour. The in-situ simulations were designed to consider:● Emergency management within specialities● Design of the new clinical environment● Equipment and ergonomics● Environmental and Human Factors such as transfers, portering, communication, manual handlingThe clinical simulations were run over multiple days, these included Major Trauma, Obstetrics and Neonatal, Critically Unwell Adult and Child, Primary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention and a Major Incident scenario. Clinicians and nurses from the Emergency Department (ED), as well as stakeholders attended from Medical specialties, Porters, Chaplaincy, Blood Bank (Biochemist and Nurse), Manual handling, Consultants in Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, Critical Care Lead for Trauma, Neonatal and Obstetrics Doctors, Paediatric speciality Doctors, Lead Resuscitation Officer, Patient Safety Officers, Theatres, Clinical Governance, and Critical Care Lead for Paediatric Critical Care.Simulations enabled the department to highlight areas where the environment required additional/specialist equipment. After each scenario, a debrief was performed, specifically looking at the non-technical/human factors/equipment issues that arose. Issues were identified with door access, lift usage, signage, transfers and manual handling. The Emergency Department (ED) was not fully operational and therefore not everything could be tested.Results:From the simulations key recommendations were made for equipment to be purchased and they highlighted the environmental factors that could impact the day-to-day running of the ED. Pharmacy raised concerns regarding medication availability in the new location and its distance from the main hospital site. The risk associated with the extended transfer routes to the main hospital with the crossing of a link bridge, the lack of lifts with no override key, and lack of signage were highlighted. New standard operation procedures were also recommended. The simulation report was presented to the ED operational team for consideration.Discussion:Overall, the simulations provided a safe environment in order to expose potential problems to the ED team prior to opening, this enabled mitigations to be actioned. The simulations also allowed for all staff to immerse themselves within the new environment to allow for familiarisation of the department prior to opening.Ethics statement:Authors confirm that all relevant ethical standards for research conduct and dissemination have been met. The submitting author confirms that relevant ethical approval was granted, if applicable.