British Columbia Simulation Network: Open Access Healthcare Simulation Resources
Being able to locate useful healthcare simulation resources can make a big difference to any clinical simulation center, medical simulation program, or simulationist looking to level up their practice. While some healthcare simulation resources come with a price tag, there are a number of resources available at no cost. This includes the healthcare simulation resources available online from the British Columbia Simulation Network (BCSN). The resources provided on the network’s website range in focus from prebriefing and debriefing to in situ training and interprofessional competency. This HealthySimulation.com article shares examples of these resources and explains how each resource can benefit the greater clinical simulation community.
BC Children’s and Women’s Simulation Pre-brief Checklist: This checklist encourages the best quality care for patient safety by practicing in an interprofessional and safe learning environment with a focus on human factors and team performance. Designed by the British Columbia Children’s Hospital, the goal of this checklist is to help each learner constantly strive to do their best work and improve.
In doing so, the checklist is broken down into five parts: psychological safety, objectives, the role of participants/facilitator, suspension of disbelief, and orientation to the learning environment. For example, psychological safety is can be broken down into the completion of a confidentiality agreement by which lessons learned are shared and not individual performances. This part of the checklist encourages questions not to be left unanswered, the recognition of the stress caused, and that mistakes are a puzzle to be solved.
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BC Hot Debrief Guide: Created by CICSL and members of BC Simulation Network and BC Emergency Medicine Network, this healthcare simulation guide provides a standardized approach to post-event clinical debriefing. Oftentimes, debriefing can be broken down using the STOP format, which stands for:
- Summarize the Case
- Things That Went Well
- Opportunities to Improve
- Points of Action
According to the guide, recent literature supports performance-focused post-event clinical debriefings facilitated by healthcare professionals familiar with established debriefing processes. Like other aspects of healthcare, bringing hot debriefing to clinical settings invites careful implementation considerations. Therefore, considerations for the introduction should include that educators and facilitators:
- Consider introducing this guide in advance of initial debriefings.
- Orientate your debriefers and your teams.
- Appreciate the impact of local culture and psychological safety.
Next, during the debriefing process, they should affirm that participation is voluntary and not compulsory, and embrace a growth mindset, and a commitment to improvement. Ultimately, facilitators should learn from success and minimize hindsight bias.
Following the debriefing, they should then assign findings to individuals for meaningful clinical improvement, and provide debriefers with ways to improve their facilitation skills. Lastly, facilitators must provide local resources for those who may benefit from further psychological support.
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Conversations presented as part of the debriefing process are typical to be facilitated as soon as possible after an event with a target duration of 10 to 15 minutes. Further, the conversations are not to assess or evaluate personal performance and they do not replace other processes associated with critical events such as PSLS reporting, accessing employee assistance programs, or formal critical incident stress debriefings.
BCSN Pre and Post In Situ Simulation Safety Checklist: Before a healthcare simulation, there are multiple safety precautions that should be considered. For example, facilitators must consider staffing needs, clinical load/acuity, workflow patterns, and equipment needs. Other factors include psychological safety/unanticipated events, infection control, and confidentiality and recording.
Developed by members of the British Columbia Simulation Network and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, these pre and post-in situ simulation safety checklists help present a number of potential issues so that facilitators can better ensure that they are as prepared as possible. Thus, this checklist lastly asks the facilitator to check yes or no to the following safety statements and ensure they have:
- Identified latent safety threats, will be communicated and reported as per organizational protocol.
- If mock resources were brought to the unit, these resources have been accounted for.
- Efforts have and will be undertaken, to notify all parties possibly affected, that the simulation is over.
- Attention has been given to assure clean-up, if applicable the following of organizational infection control protocols.
Additional BCSN Healthcare Simulation Resources
In Situ Healthcare Training Sign: These are signs that can be printed and displayed while running your in-situ simulations to inform the public, non-participating staff, and anyone else who may be concerned about the events unfolding around them.
Learning From Success Debriefing Tool: LFS is a method of debriefing that focuses “on learning how healthcare professionals work towards actively trading-off conflicting goals to find the best possible balance between efficiency, thoroughness, and safety for the individual patient and within the healthcare system.” This process involves honing in on what led to good performance by revealing the factors which affected the clinical decision-making of individuals and the team.
Simulation Summary: This is a fillable PDF that can be used after a simulation session to provide an overview of the session and the learning points from the debrief that can be shared with the participants, leadership, and/or others from the department/team who could not attend.
Self-Assessment Tool for Simulation Educators: This evaluation, designed by members of the BC Simulation Network, helps facilitators clarify and identify the many competencies and expected behaviors of a simulation educator.
More About the British Columbia Simulation Network
The BC Simulation Network (BCSN) is a community of practice that provides British Columbia’s healthcare simulation centers, programs, and enthusiasts with a forum in which to discuss and advance ideas at the intersection of health professions education, simulation practice, technologies, ongoing competency and delivery of health services.
The community also provides an opportunity to share resources and align operations in an effort to improve access and use of simulation provincially. The BCSN collaborates to host the BCSimulation website and the BC Simulation Tracking Tool. In addition, the BCSN serves as a collective voice for advocacy and the advancement of research and best practices in healthcare simulation. This network grew out of the Simulation Technology Working Group (STWG).
Full List of British Columbia Simulation Network Resources
Lance Baily, BA, EMT-B, is the Founder & CEO of HealthySimulation.com, which he started while serving as the Director of the Nevada System of Higher Education’s Clinical Simulation Center of Las Vegas back in 2010. Lance is also the Founder and acting Advisor to the Board of SimGHOSTS.org, the world’s only non-profit organization dedicated to supporting professionals operating healthcare simulation technologies. His co-edited Book: “Comprehensive Healthcare Simulation: Operations, Technology, and Innovative Practice” is cited as a key source for professional certification in the industry. Lance’s background also includes serving as a Simulation Technology Specialist for the LA Community College District, EMS fire fighting, Hollywood movie production, rescue diving, and global travel. He and his wife Abigail Baily, PhD live in Las Vegas, Nevada with their two amazing daughters.
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