Gett'n on the bus: evaluation of Sentinel City®3.0 virtual simulation in community/population health clinical placement

Using virtual simulation to teach evidence-based practice in nursing curricula: A rapid review

BACKGROUND

Virtual simulation is an interactive teaching and learning strategy used in undergraduate nursing student education, especially since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Few published studies have reviewed the impact of virtual simulation as a strategy for teaching nursing students the elements of evidence-based practice.

AIM

To describe types of virtual simulation that are relevant to nursing student education and examine how these modalities are applied to teach elements of evidence-based practice.

METHODS

A rapid review of literature was conducted to discern the use and impact of virtual simulation. Thirty-seven studies published between 2017 and May 2021 that addressed nursing students' educational outcomes were reviewed and summarized as a narrative analysis.

RESULTS

Virtual simulation and virtual reality simulation engage learners in role-plays via a computer screen or hand-held phone. Various levels of realism and immersion were apparent across different modalities and with the utilization of educational games. Most studies related to the teaching of best practice evidence-based clinical nursing topics. Twenty primary studies reported objective measures of students' improvement such as knowledge, performance, better documentation, or communication accuracy. Sixteen studies that measured knowledge identified significant knowledge gains. All studies endorsed virtual simulation as a teaching method.

LINKING EVIDENCE TO ACTION

Virtual simulation approaches offer an innovative and feasible option for teaching nursing students. Such approaches should be included in undergraduate nursing curricula. While it is apparent that evidence-based practice guidelines inform the design of the virtual simulation scenarios, the effectiveness of the modality for teaching specific elements of evidence-based practice to nursing students is not yet confirmed. Nursing curricula need to include ways of teaching nursing students to search for and critically appraise trustworthy sources of knowledge for clinical practice.

Finding the right balance: student perceptions of using virtual simulation as a community placement

OBJECTIVES

Finding appropriate community clinical placements has been challenging in recent years, most especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the 2020-2021 semesters, a university in the province of Alberta, Canada chose to use the community health virtual simulation program, Sentinel City®3.1, to provide clinical placements for three groups of undergraduate students. This expository paper, co-authored by students and faculty, sought to further explore how virtual simulation can be used to best support student learning by identifying practices that students find most helpful.

METHOD

Jeffries' (2005) simulation framework was used to guide a quality improvement analysis which explored feedback received from 16 students regarding the use of Sentinel City®3.1 as a clinical placement, with additional contributions from the student co-authors.

RESULTS

Students felt Sentinel City®3.1 was an effective tool to learn community and population health concepts, however, all students indicated that they would have preferred more opportunities to work with real communities.

CONCLUSION

Virtual simulation programs like Sentinel City®3.1 might be best as a learning supplement rather than as students' sole clinical placement experience.

Nursing Interns' Attitudes Toward, Preferences for, and Use of Diabetes Virtual Simulation Teaching Applications in China: National Web-Based Survey

BACKGROUND

Diabetes has placed heavy social and economic burdens on society and families worldwide. Insufficient knowledge and training of frontline medical staff, such as nurses, interns, and residents, may lead to an increase in acute and chronic complications among patients with diabetes. However, interns have insufficient knowledge about diabetes management. The factors that affect interns' current level of diabetes-related knowledge are still unclear. Therefore, understanding the behavioral intentions of interns is essential to supporting the development and promotion of the use of virtual simulation teaching applications.

OBJECTIVE

This study aimed to identify the determinants of nursing interns' intentions to use simulation-based education applications.

METHODS

From December 1, 2020, to February 28, 2021, the web-based survey tool Sojump (Changsha Xingxin Information Technology Co) was used to survey nursing interns in hospitals across China. Two survey links were sent to 37 partner schools in 23 major cities in China, and they were disseminated through participants' WeChat networks. Multiple regression analysis was used to determine the association between demographic information and basic disease information and the use of the application for treating adult patients.

RESULTS

Overall, 883 nursing interns from 23 provinces in China responded to the survey. Among them, the virtual simulation utilization rate was 35.6% (314/883) and the awareness rate was 10.2% (90/883). In addition, among the interns, only 10.2% (90/883) correctly understood the concept of virtual simulation, and most of them (793/883, 89.8%) believed that scenario-simulation training or the use of models for teaching are all the same. Multiple regression analysis showed that the educational level, independent learning ability, and professional identity of the interns were related to use of the application (P<.05). Skills and knowledge that the interns most wanted to acquire included the treatment of hypoglycemia (626/883, 70.9%), functional test simulation (610/883, 69.1%), and blood glucose monitoring technology (485/883, 54.9%). A total of 60.5% (534/883) of the interns wanted to acquire clinical thinking skills, while 16.0% (141/883) wanted to acquire operational skills. Nursing trainees believed that the greatest obstacles to virtual simulation included limited time (280/883, 31.7%), the degree of simulation (129/883, 14.6%), the demand for satisfaction (108/883, 12.2%), and test scores (66/883, 7.5%).

CONCLUSIONS

The understanding and usage rate of diabetes virtual simulation teaching applications by Chinese nursing interns is very low. However, they have high requirements regarding this teaching method. Conducting high-quality randomized controlled trials and designing applications that are suitable for the needs of different nurse trainees will increase students' interest in learning and help improve diabetes knowledge among nursing interns.