High-fidelity patient simulators to expose undergraduate students to the clinical relevance of physiology concepts

PHYSIOLOGY EDUCATORS are often faced with the difficulty of showing students the clinical relevance of the science they are learning. This occurs at the healthcare professional level before clinical rotations with direct patient encounters. This challenge is likely even more prevalent during undergraduate training as students are years away from exposure to an actual healthcare setting. Physiology, which is arguably the foundation of clinical medicine, is a difficult subject for students of all levels to learn for various reasons, including the fact that it is conceptual and highly integrated (8). Therefore, finding avenues for undergraduate students, especially those in healthcare career tracks, to experience the clinical relevance of physiology “in action” may help student engagement, enthusiasm, and learning of physiology as well as help guide career choices. The use of high-fidelity patient simulators (HFPSs) has expanded throughout medical, nursing, and allied health professions education in the last decades. These manikins can be programmed to represent pathological states and are used to teach clinical skills as well as clinical reasoning. First, the students are typically oriented either to the manikin or prebriefed about the specific case or scenario. This is followed by the 15- to 30-min simulation itself with a subsequent debrief about the experience (9). These HFPS experiences have been shown to improve learning and retention of physiology concepts in medical students (2, 5, 6). Interestingly, the use of HFPSs has also expanded into high school, college, and graduate schools in an effort to add problem-solving and critical thinking components to science classes (9). Gordon and Oriol (4) from the Harvard Summer Preclinical Institute have shown that student reflection reveals a deep satisfaction with the experience. Participation in these classes helped to improve confidence and reinforce humanism as well as providing clarity for future career choices (4). Although the idea of incorporating HFPSs within undergraduate courses appears beneficial on multiple levels, there are limited data regarding implementation and learning outcomes of the experience. The purpose of this report is to share the data and reflections from a HFPS experience for biomedical students in our undergraduate program. The 2-h HFPS experience was part of an upper-level undergraduate course titled “Laboratory Virtual Simulations in Physiology,” which is a mixed-mode class consisting of laboratory modules and limited face-to-face lecture time. The HFPS experience was developed and facilitated by faculty members from the University Central Florida College of Medicine and School of Biomedical Sciences. The goals of this study were to determine the feasibility of the simulation activity, whether learning occurred in the activity, and whether students were engaged during the activity. A pretest and posttest were designed and given to participants to test knowledge and perceptions of teamwork and communication skills. This study was reviewed and exempted by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Central Florida, and students participated with informed consent.