Teaching with Simulated Patients: Evaluation of the Long-Term Effectiveness of Instruction

Previous reports have detailed the efficacy of simulated patients as instructors, giving immediatefeedback on genital/ rectal examination techniques. This prospective study compares the long-term retention of technical and interpersonal skills learnedfrom simulated patients versus traditional methods. The members of a sophomore medical school class were randomly assigned to one of two instructionalprograms during their Introduction to Clinical Medicine course. A random sample from each group was evaluated shortly afterwards. Significant differences were found for 22 of 27 items rates. A similar evaluation was repeated when the students became seniors. The two groups were still different in 13 areas. The results demonstrate the superiority ofsimulated patient training for long-term retention of instructional material. Even 18 months of intervening clinical exposure could not compensatefor initial differences.