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Original

Training staff to create simple interactive virtual patients: the impact on a medical and healthcare institution

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Pages 764-769 | Published online: 09 Sep 2009
 

Abstract

Background: Virtual patients (VPs) are excellent teaching tools for developing clinical decision-making skills and improving clinical competency, but are believed to be very expensive and time consuming to make.

Aim: The aim of this study was to establish whether it was possible to design a workshop for VP creation, which would enable teaching staff to create interactive, immersive VPs quickly, and with limited technical support.

Methods: The Centre for Medical and Healthcare Education at St George's University of London's (SGUL) medical school developed an ergonomic and generic ‘model’ for VP creation, simple enough for clinicians and educators to use, yet flexible enough to simulate real decisions through non-linear pathways. One-day workshops were set up to support the development of VPs by medical and healthcare educators.

Results: VP creation workshops have been successfully trialled, attracting a large number of clinicians and educators from a range of medicine and healthcare courses. Feedback from participants was very positive. Educators, organised into small groups, were unable to complete VPs within the workshop, but many groups completed a VP after the workshop. Interest was highest in mental health.

Discussion: The workshops catalysed a change in the awareness of the value of VPs, with staff directly integrating VPs into the curriculum.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jonathan Round

JONATHAN ROUND is a Consultant Paediatrician and Senior Lecturer who runs the Child Health component of the Graduate Entry Programme at SGUL. His area of specialisation is Paediatric Intensive Care. His research area is intensive care in oncology patients. Jonathan works with the eLearning unit in the development of virtual patients and their rational use.

Emily Conradi

EMILY CONRADI is the Manager for e-Learning Innovation at SGUL. Emily has been involved in the development of internal virtual patients, trialling and evaluating their use in formative assessment, PBL and their applicability for a virtual world platform.

Terry Poulton

TERRY POULTON is the Head of the eLearning Unit at the Department of Medical Education at SGUL and responsible for both the delivery of e-Learning and all R&D. Terry has been responsible for development of the scenario based ‘learning week’ for the MBBS medical curriculum and the case-based learning Paramedic Foundation degree at SGUL.

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