Tag Archives: debriefing

August 8, 2023 · 11:07 am

HUMBLE: Six Traits That Will Make You a Better Simulation Educator and Lead Effective Debriefings

HUMBLE: Six Traits That Will Make You a Better Simulation Educator and Lead Better Debriefings

Excelling as a educator in the healthcare simulation field goes beyond just imparting knowledge; it requires a unique set of qualities that can truly make a difference in students’ learning experiences. The acronym HUMBLE focuses on six key traits that can help educators better design, facilitate, and lead more effective debriefings. These traits include Humility, Understanding, Mindfulness, Balance, Learning, and Engaging. In this blog post, I will delve into these traits and explore how they can enhance your abilities as an educator, ultimately leading to more impactful and engaging debriefing sessions.

H – Humility

This is one of my favorites and the most important in my humble opinion! Approaching teaching responsibilities in simulation from a perspective of humility goes a long way. Instructors, with humility, acknowledge that they don’t know everything and remain open to continuous learning. This attitude is also imparted to the participants, encouraging them to adopt the same approach throughout their careers.

An instructor who demonstrates humility creates a more approachable and non-threatening atmosphere, allowing students to feel comfortable admitting to and learning from their errors. This also contributes to a milieu that helps maintain a safe learning environment and a perspective of a level playing field that helps to allow participants of the simulation to share their thoughts. This, in turn, gives us as faculty a privileged glimpse into their thought processes. Interestingly, it is also well-known in business literature that leaders who demonstrate humility are often perceived as more credible and trustworthy.

U – Understanding

Understanding the fact that each participant of your simulation is a person that has their individual lives, challenges, successes, experiences, and strong and weak skills is key to understanding the fact that there are varying amounts of knowledge and/or abilities for the person to apply that knowledge in the simulated session. In other words, many factors contribute to why someone knows something or can apply knowledge in each situation. We should maintain an understanding that everyone has gaps in knowledge and attempt to remain nonjudgmental as to why those gaps exist.

M – Mindfulness

It is incredibly important that we are mindful of our presence during the simulation as well as the debriefing. Educators need to be attentive, focused, immersed, and committed to the learning objectives to expertly facilitate and then lead a high-quality debriefing that contributes to the learning outcomes. We need to work to identify tips and challenges that help maintain our mindfulness, focus, and attention during these activities.

While I am not suggesting a prescriptive approach, it is important to introspect and determine how you enhance your mindfulness associated with the simulation-based education process. For some, it means being well rested; for others, it means appropriately titrated doses of caffeine, and yet for others, exhaustive preparation the day before. Reflect on your performance by thinking about when your concentration may have waxed and waned and what you can do to improve. I find it particularly challenging to remain cognitively sharp throughout the entire series when running the same scenario repeatedly with different groups of learners!

B – Balance

Creating the mindset of balance in any one simulation session helps participants discover what they need to improve upon and what they did well in each simulation encounter. There is an old saying, “The negative screams, while the positive only whispers….. ” that I think you would agree applies when we are facilitating a simulation and about to go into the debriefing. If you think about it from the learner’s perspective, exploring a laundry list of their failures without recognizing the contributions that went well can be demoralizing and interfere with the faculty/participant relationship. While I’m not suggesting that we gloss over egregious errors, it is important to find a balance between those activities that went well and those that need improvement.

L – Limited, Lifelong Learning

This may be my second favorite! When conducting the debriefing, faculty should avoid trying to comment or debrief on every single thing in every scenario. It is important to remember that the journey of healthcare, whether in a simulated environment, attending lectures, attending workshops, or generating experiences by taking care of real patients, is a lifelong learning process. Each encounter along the way provides the potential for learning, albeit limited by the amount of cognitive transfer that can occur at a given time. During simulation, there is a natural tendency to want to cram everything into every scenario. I think this emanates from the fact that we are so excited about the simulation modality and get a small opportunity with each participant! Admittedly, I need to keep myself in check during such encounters. It’s important to think of the human brain as a sponge. Once it is saturated, the sponge cannot effectively take on more water.

E – Engagement

Engaging the learners in the conversation, as well as designing the scenarios to engage learners actively, is part and parcel of the basis of the idea that simulation, through active learning, is a high-quality opportunity. Think about this during the design process of your scenarios as well as the debriefings, insofar as how you assign roles, what your observers are required to do, and how you rotate people in and out of the scenario.

During the debriefing, remember that engaging your learners so that they are responding to the prompts you provide during the debriefing will elicit the responses. As the learners are engaged in the conversation, you can listen to their thought processes and make evaluations of the depth of their knowledge around a particular topic. Additionally, you can identify gaps that exist, either in knowledge or the application of knowledge, that can help them improve for the future. So often, when training others in debriefing, I observe faculty members dropping into a mode of “mini-lecture” during what is supposed to be a debriefing. This deviates from active cognitive engagement and sometimes transcends into (a well-intentioned) one-way conversation. It is important to remember that if your participants are not engaged, you are potentially squandering some of the learning opportunities. At a minimum, you are giving up the ability to hear what they are thinking.

In summary, as you continue to develop your skills as a healthcare simulation educator, I invite you to use HUMBLE as an acronym that helps to reflect upon positive traits, actions, and good guiding principles, that provide learners with an optimized environment for improvement.  I truly think that healthcare simulation educators have powerful opportunities for assisting with the transfer of knowledge, and experience and creating opportunities for reflection, and by being HUMBLE we can ensure a more effective and empathetic learning environment for all participants.

Until Next Time,

Happy Simulating!

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November 24, 2021 · 3:21 pm

Adjuncts to Enhance Debriefing

I wanted to discuss some ideas of using adjuncts as part of your debriefing.

When we think about debriefing, we often think about a conversation between faculty member or members and participants of simulation with a focus on everyone developing an understanding of what they did right as well as what they need to improve upon.  We rarely think about the possibility of including other “things” to enhance the learning that comes from the debriefing.

I tend to incorporate adjuncts into a many of the debriefings associated with courses that I design.  What I mean is things that added into the debriefing process/environment that can enhance the discussion.  Sometimes with deliberate purpose, and other times just to mix it up a little bit so that it is not just a dialogue between the participants and the faculty.  It may be something technical, it may be something as simple as a paper handout.

Simple Task Trainer as an Adjunct

Some ideas of adjuncts include PowerPoint slide deck or a few targeted slides that help to review a complex topic, one that requires a deeper understanding, or a subject that benefits from repetition of exposure.  Another type of adjunct is the simulator log file which can help set the stage for the debriefing and create a pathway of discussion that chronologically follows what happened during the simulation.  Another adjunct could be a partial task trainer or a model that helps to describe or demonstrate something.  For example, the students forgot to do a jaw-thrust or open the airway.  We can use a task trainer, or a teaching aide incorporated into the discussion during the debriefing.  

Example of an Algorithm Poster on the Wall

Other things that I use are charts, graphs, and algorithms that may represent best practices.  When I debrief during my difficult airway management course for physicians, I have the algorithm up on the wall hanging as a poster.  We use the algorithm posters as a pathway to compare the performance of the participants of the simulation with what the ideal case would be.  You can use the adjunct learning aid as a reference to standards.  This can help you to take yourself out of the direct argument of right vs. wrong.  This allows use of the adjunct as a third-party messenger of a reference to best practices excellence when I have the participants compare their performance against what appears on the algorithm.  This allows them to discover their own variations from the expected standard.  It tends to create powerful learning moments without the faculty having to be “the bearer of bad news!”

I think that if you start to strategically think about how to incorporate adjuncts into your debriefing you will find the students are more satisfied with the debriefing.  It also increases the stickiness of the learning and creates a more enjoyable experience for the faculty member as well as the participants.  Try it!  It does not have to be fancy!

Thanks, and as always,

Happy Simulating!

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May 22, 2020 · 3:00 pm

Where do we Debrief?

Selecting the location to conduct the debriefing after a simulation is a decision that often has many variable. Sometimes there are limited choices and the choice is dictated by what is available, or what space holds the technology that is deemed essential to the debriefing. Other times there is deliberate planning and selection.

This short video explores some of the basics of how such decisions are made and some of the pros and cons associated with the final choices.

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August 19, 2019 · 11:50 am

Five Pearls for Debriefing 

Sharing some practical considerations to help you with your debriefing efforts!

 

Shell with a pearl

1. Before you begin attend to learner readiness 

Before you begin ensuring the emotional readiness of your learners will be a huge benefit. Learning during a debriefing can be enhanced by reducing distractions. Such distractions can occur from many possible origins. If learners are particularly stressed, angry or perhaps sad after a simulation experience it is best to let them process their emotions or otherwise emotionally and mentally prepare themselves to be able to focus on the content of the debriefing. So, taking a few minutes to observe, or perhaps even directly asking, “Are you ready?” may go a long way. Also, another tool that I use after a stressful simulation is to just acknowledge that there may be stress with a statement such as “Wow. That looked stressful. Are you guys ready to talk about it?” 

2. During the debriefing, listen to the learners, analyze their thoughts and understanding 

A structured debriefing should provide the opportunity to listen to learners. This allows the debriefer to analyze if the learners have a command of the facts and understanding of the intended learning associated with the simulation. It is easy to become impatient with the process and start telling the learners what they need to know. Once this occurs, it is difficult to assess what the learners do know and understand. As you listen to learners during the debriefing think about what you need to ask next, or where you need to take the conversation to be able to analyze the next area of content you wish to explore during the debriefing. So another tip is shift your thoughts to how can I discover if my learners know….. as opposed to the normal transmittal of information that comes from thinking I need to tell them X, Y and Z so that they understand. 

3. What went right is as important as what went wrong 

There is a saying that the negative screams and the positive whispers. This could not be truer when it comes to debriefing. It is far easier to remember what people did wrong during a scenario, then what they did right. But if you sit back and think about it, they are equally as important. Learners leaving a debriefing understanding that they did correctly and why it was correct, paired with an understanding what they did wrong and why it was wrong is critically important for improvement to occur. If the right things are not debriefed, it may be that they were done out of habit or luck and that the learners don’t understand it at all! Or worse yet, they could be perceived as unimportant. So a good tip is to jot some noted down of things that went correctly during a scenario. Trust me, you’ll remember all those mistakes which will be screaming! 

4. Keep the debriefing focused 

A challenge for anyone conducting a debriefing is to keep things focused. Learners love to talk about what learners want to talk about. However, it’s important as the facilitators of the conversation that we have the learners talking about what they need to be talking about. What learners need to be talking about should be driven by the learning objectives of the scenario. This direction needs to come from the debriefer. There is a delicate relationship that exists between the learners and the debriefer so carefully thinking about how to maintain this but being able to gently nudge the conversation back to the right pathway is a skill worth concentrating on. A tip is to develop some scripts that you are comfortable using when such nudging need to occur.  

Consider this example, “I agree that the exact dosage of the medication is critically important, but for this scenario and debriefing we are tasked with focusing on the effectiveness of the communications within the team. So, who can give me an example of effective communications that occurred during the scenario?”  

 5. Bring out summary/take home points 

Every simulation has a plethora of opportunities for learning. It is the job of the debriefer to ensure that the primary learning objectives of the simulation are covered. During complicated cases or cases with multiple learning objectives it is possible to cover a lot of ground along with many topics and facts during the time when you are analyzing the learners grasp of the content. It is important to close with summary points that are crucial take home messages. This can be challenging for some, and often turns into a mini lecture. And remember when you start lecturing to the learners, you are sacrificing the ability to ensure understanding where the learner is at that point and time. Concluding or beginning the wrap up of the debriefing by asking leaners to give one or two things that they think went well during the scenario along with what they would  change next time can be an effective probe into understanding that the learners took away the big learning messages. It also serves as the time to allow you to shape the discussion with further questions that drive home the intended take away points. Always think to yourself what are the two or three things that I want them to remember most from this experience a month from now. 

Well that’s is for now. Remember debriefing gets better with practice, feedback and experience. So, get out there, debrief, get some feedback and debrief again! 

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July 23, 2019 · 2:20 pm

5 Elements in My Approach to the Learning Contract in Simulation

In simulation-based education there is a relationship between the faculty of the program and the participants that is important during all aspects of simulation. The relationship has tenets of trust and respect that must be considered when designing as well as conducting simulations. I have heard this relationship referred to by a few titles such as psychological contract, fiction contract, learning contract, all of which are generally referring to the same thing.Smiling asian female vacancy candidate shaking hand with hr manager

Probably more important than the title, is what such a relationship embodies or focuses on. I view it as an agreement between two or more parties that acknowledges several aspects of simulation based programs and works to establish rules of engagement and principles of interactions between those involved.

In my practice of using simulation for clinical education I work a great deal with practicing professionals, who by in large are physicians. I generally adhere to five elements or premises over the course of interactions that I design as well as provide for the participants of my programs.

  1. Meaningful use of Your Time.

Acknowledging up front that participating in learning activities takes time away from their busy schedule. I assure them that the content of the program is carefully crafted to fill the needs of their learning cohort in the mostly timely way possible. I refer to refinements of the course that have occurred in response to feedback from prior participants to help increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the program.

  1. This is NOT real and that’s really ok!

During the orientation I am always careful to point out that not everything they are going to experience will look or feel real. I include the idea that things are “real-enough” to help us create a successful learning environment. I also let them know the things that may feel somewhat real during the simulation. Additionally, I emphasize that the “realness” is not the primary focus and point out that the learning and reinforcement of high-quality clinical practice is the ultimate outcome.

  1. We are not here to trick you.

I find that practicing professionals often come to simulation training endeavors with an idea that we design programs to exploit their mistakes. I assure them this is not the case. I am careful to include an overview of what they can expect during all phases of the learning. For example, when I am conducting difficult airway programs, I carefully orient them to every feature of the simulators airway mechanics before starting any scenarios. I also let them know that the cases associated with our scenarios are modeled after actual cases of clinical care. I explain that while we don’t model every detail of the case, that we work hard to design situations that provide opportunity to promote discussion and learning that would have or should have resulted from the actual case.

  1. Everyone makes mistakes. We are here to learn from each other.

At the most basic part of this element, I point out that WE all make mistakes and that is part of being human. I let them know that everyone is likely to make a mistake throughout the learning program. I carefully weave in the idea that it is far better to make mistakes in the simulated environment as opposed to when providing actual clinical care.

Further, I advance the idea that we can learn from each other. As everyone in clinical practice knows, there are many ways to do most things correctly. While this idea can be challenging because often people feel that “their way” is the correct way, I point out that with an open mind and professional, collaborative discussion we can share learnings with each other.

Contract Signing Concept

  1. We are here to help you be the best you can be.

Leveraging the idea that almost all practicing professional hold themselves to high levels of performance standards as well as the desire to improve can provide a powerful connection between the faculty and participants of a healthcare simulation program. I put forth this idea along with carefully tying in a review of the prior four elements. Further, I point out to them the opportunity to perfect the routine exists in our learning programs. I then pivot to highlight that some aspects of the program exist to practice and learn from situations that they may encounter infrequently that may have high stakes for the patient.

So, in summary, I believe the relationship between faculty members and participants of simulation-based education programs is multi-factorial and demands attention. Depending on the learners and the topics of the program, the elements that serve as the underpinning of the relationship may range from few to many, and moderate to significant in complexity.

In my simulation work providing clinical education that involves practicing physicians as participants, I pay close attention to the five elements described above throughout the design as well as the conducting of the learning encounters.

I invite you to reflect upon your approach to the development and maintenance of the relationship between your faculty and participants of your simulation efforts.

 

 

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February 17, 2017 · 5:32 pm

Patient Centered Debriefing – Putting the Patient First – A MUST for Healthcare Simulation

patientcentereddebiriefingDebriefing in healthcare education is a specific type of communication designed to allow enhanced learning through a post hoc analysis and (ideally) structured conversation of an event. While there are many different styles and methods commonly described for use in healthcare simulations there are generally some consistent principles. Common features of the goals of just about every debriefing method includes attempting to ensure that the participants involved in the event leave with an understanding of areas in which they performed well and areas that they could improve upon should the face a similar situation in the future.

Debriefing is not easy to do well for a variety of reasons, and suffice it to say generally improves with practice and a focus on improvement. Depending on the facilitator and/or the learner(s) many people struggle with ensuring learners depart the debriefing with a clear understanding of areas needed for improvement. Other times debriefers can make the mistake of focusing only on the negative, forgetting to elucidate the things that may have been done well.

I believe we need to always incorporate the needs of the patient into the debriefing. The thought that the simulation benefits the patient should permeate throughout the planning of all events in healthcare simulation including the debriefing.

With the proliferation of simulation based learning over the last two decades there has been an increased interest in faculty development and training of people to develop debriefing skills. Nearly every discussion of faculty training in the simulation healthcare simulation space includes some discussion of the safe learning environment and student-centered learning. These concepts are embedded in nearly every discussion and every publication on debriefing and feedback.

Ostensibly the safe learning environment is referring to a facilitator controlling the environment of simulations and debriefings to provide an environment of comfort that encourages participants to be able to share freely what is on their mind during the simulation and the debriefing without fear of repercussion, ridicule or reprisal. I also believe that it should encourage simulation faculty to remain vigilant for opportunities that need some sort active facilitation to assist a participant thought to be struggling with the situation from either an emotional or perhaps stressful stimulus.

Having been involved in the teaching of healthcare providers for almost thirty years and when thinking backing to the late eighties, I personally participated in early “simulations” designed to “knock students off of their game”. Thus, I can certainly relate to, and applaud the emergence of the concept of a safe-environment.

However, I now believe that the concept of a student-centered approach to healthcare education contributes to the illusion that the student is the ultimate benefactor of healthcare education programs. The concept has evolved because of a natural parenteral feeling of protection for students, along with the fact that experiential learning can be stressful. Balancing these factors can likely contribute to highly effective learning as well as a positive learning experience for the participant.

When applied to healthcare education student-centered learning can be a bit misleading, perhaps a bit irresponsible, in so far that it completely ignores the fact that the patient is the ultimate recipient of the educational efforts. It may be more comfortable for the faculty in the immediate because the student is present and the patient is not. However, if you think about it, down-stream it is likely incomplete and ultimately may do a disservice to both the learners and their patients.

The challenge is that when the pervasive thought process is student-centered, the culture, requisite curriculum and learning opportunity design will favor such a position. This can subtly influence the debriefing and interactions with participants in a way that fails to correct inaccurate or poor performance and/or reinforce decisions or actions that should be carried forward to actual care.

My colleagues and I have coined the term Patient-Centered Debriefing. I originally talked about it on my simulation blog in 2013. In the training of debriefers and the modeling of debriefing, we encourage the consideration of the needs of the patient and these seems to pull to a more appropriate anchor point. This slight shift in focus can also help to humanize the situation beyond the needs of the learner. Taking on the responsibility of eventual care of an actual patient can shift the mindset of the instructor to ensure the real goals of the simulations are met.

What does patient-centered debriefing look like? At casual observation it would appear the same as any other debriefing that is conducted with acceptable methods in 2017 under a premise of student centered debriefing. The difference is the facilitator(s), as well as perhaps the students, would be considering the ultimate patient outcomes associated with the learning objectives of the given scenario. Thus, if properly conducted, facilitator(s) would be less likely to gloss over or omit reconciliation of mistakes and/or errors of commission or omission that occurred during a simulation that would likely contribute to adverse sequela for the patient in a comparable actual healthcare setting. Simultaneously, however the facilitator will be maintaining the enshrined traditional “safe learning environment”.

In considering the needs of the patient there is a subtle reminder that it is our job as healthcare educators to best prepare learners for this reality and the time that we have to do it in is precious.  Further, particularly in simulation based learning it should be an ever present reminder that this is our ultimate purpose. I think it is particularly important for simulation facilitators who are not actively involved in the care of patients to consider this position. This is not to suggest that they are not doing a great job, but it seems like a reasonable active reminder to consider the needs of the patients who will be cared for by the learners involved in the simulation.

I am not suggesting that we abandon the attention to providing a safe learning environment for simulations as well as clinical learning environments. I do believe that this contributes to effective learning particularly in the simulated setting. I do believe that we need to reconsider the concept of student-centered learning insofar as the student being thought of as the epicenter of the overall education process and outcomes.

Reserving the definition and concepts of student centricity for considering the scholarly needs, learning styles, designs and appeals to the intrinsic motivating factors seem more appropriate. Any learning program in healthcare is far better to have a patient-centered axis from which all other actions and designs emerge.

I invite you to consider adopting a patient-centered debriefing into your work!

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April 25, 2016 · 1:03 pm

Learning from Simulation – Far more than the Debriefing

Most people have heard someone say “In Simulation, debriefing is where all of the learning occurs.” I frequently hear this when running faculty development workshops and programs, which isn’t as shocking as hearing this espoused at national and international meetings in front of large audiences! What a ridiculous statement without a shred of evidence or a realistic common sense approach to think it would be so. Sadly, I fear it represents an unfortunate instructor-centered perspective and/or a serious lack of appreciation for potential learning opportunities provided by simulation based education.LearningDuringSimulation2

Many people academically toil over the technical definitions of the word feedback and try to contrast in from a description of debriefing as if they are juxtaposed. They often present it in a way as if one is good and the other is bad. There is a misguided notion that feedback is telling someone, or lecturing to someone to get a point across. I believe that is a narrow interpretation of the word. I think that there are tremendous opportunities for learning from many facets of simulation that may be considered feedback.

Well-designed simulation activities hopefully provide targeted learning opportunities of which part of it is experiential, sometimes immersive, in some way. I like to think of debriefing as one form of feedback that a learner may encounter during simulation based learning, commonly occurring after engaging in some sort of immersive learning activity or scenario. Debriefing can be special if done properly and will actually allow the learner to “discover” new knowledge, perhaps reinforce existing knowledge, or maybe even have corrections made to inaccurate knowledge. No matter how you look at it at the end of the day it is a form of feedback, that can likely lead, or contribute to learning. But to think that during the debriefing is the only opportunity for learning is incredibly short-sighted.

There are many other forms of feedback and learning opportunities that learners may experience in the course of well-designed simulation based learning. The experience of the simulation itself is ripe with opportunities for feedback. If a learner puts supplemental oxygen on a simulated patient that is demonstrating hypoxia on the monitor via the pulse oximetry measurements and the saturations improve, that is a form of feedback. Conversely, if the learner(s) forgets to provide the supplemental oxygen and the saturations or other signs of respiratory distress continue to worsen then that can be considered feedback as well. The latter two example examples are what I refer to as intrinsic feedback as they are embedded in the scenario design to provide clues to the learners, as well as to approximate what may happen to a real patient in a similar circumstance.

With regard to intrinsic feedback, it is only beneficial if it is recognized and properly interpreted by the learner(s) either while actively involved in the simulated clinical encounter, and if not, perhaps in the debriefing. The latter should be employed if the intrinsically designed feedback is important to accomplishing the learning objectives germane to the simulation.

There are still other forms of feedback that likely contribute to the learning that are not part of the debriefing. In the setting of a simulated learning encounter involving several learners, the delineation of duties, the acceptance or rejection of treatment suggestions are all potentially ripe for learning. If a learner suggests a therapy that is embraced by the team, or perhaps stimulates a group discussion during the course of the scenario the resultant conversation and ultimate decision can significantly add to the learning of the involved participants.

Continuing that same idea, perhaps the decision to provide, withhold, or check the dosage of a particularly therapy invokes a learner to check a reference, or otherwise look up a reference that provides valuable information that solidifies a piece of information in the mind of the leaner. The learner may announce such findings to the team while the scenario is still underway thereby sharing the knowledge with the rest of the treatment team. Waaah Laaaah…… more learning that may occur outside of the debriefing!

Finally, I believe there is an additional source of learning that occurs outside of the debriefing. Imagine when a learner experiences something or becomes aware of something during a scenario which causes them to realize they have a knowledge gap in that particular area. Maybe they forgot a critical drug indication, dosage or adverse interaction. Perhaps there was something that just stimulated their natural curiosity. It is possible that those potential learning items are not covered in the debriefing as they may not be core to the learning objectives. This may indeed stimulate the learner to engage in self-study to enhance their learning further to close that perceived area of a knowledge gap. What???? Why yes, more learning outside of the debriefing!

In fact, we hope that this type of stimulation occurs on the regular basis as a part of active learning that may have been prompted by the experiential aspects provided by simulation. Such individual stimulation of learning is identified in the sentinel publication of Dr. Barry Issenberg et al in Vol 27 of Medical Teacher in 2005 describing key features of effective simulation.

So hopefully I have convinced you, or reinforced your belief that the potential for learning from simulation based education spans far beyond the debriefing. Please recognize that this statement made by others likely reflects a serious misunderstanding and underappreciation for learning that can and should be considered with the use of simulation. The implication of such short-sightedness can have huge impacts on the efficiency and effectiveness of simulation that begin with curriculum and design.

So the next time you are incorporating simulation into your education endeavor, sit back and think of all of the potential during which learning may occur. Of course the debriefing in one such activity during which we hope learning to occur. Thinking beyond the debriefing and designing for the bigger picture of potential learning that can be experienced by the participants is likely going to help you achieve positive outcomes from your overall efforts.

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September 16, 2015 · 7:23 pm

Simulation can be Fun. And Serious.

shutterstock_286597808aI was recently energized by sitting in the back of one of our simulation rooms where two of my faculty colleagues were running simulations for some of Emergency Medicine Residents. They had prepared the session well and had clearly established a previously great and trusting relationship with the residents in a safe learning kind of way.

The residents seemed relaxed, smiling, and many were attending the session dressed in the likes of Khacki shorts, Teva’s and a Hawaiian shirt or two. During one of the scenarios the faculty member operating the simulator made a mistake and the “patient” took a turn for the worse when the correct treatment was ordered. He was on the other side of the glass and immediately said something funny about his mistake over the room speakers in a self-deprecating way. Everyone in the room was cracking up including the other faculty members, me, all of the team members and the resident observers. The simulation came to an end a few minutes later as the rest of the learning objectives were met

During the debriefing the faculty member called out his mistake once again to another round of snickers. Superficially it seemed that he was trying to be funny. Deeper I think he was level setting to ensure there wasn’t confusion of the change in status over the patient. Additionally he was ensuring to demonstrate the safe learning environment in so far as declaring that he was capable of making mistakes as well.

A few moments later the residents were engaged in a debriefing using the Structured and Supportive Debriefing Model and the GAS tool. During the debriefing many topics were covered ranging from teamwork, the initial care and stabilization of the patient, to aberrancies in the electrical system of the heart leading to wide complex tachycardia that can mimic ventricular tachycardia.

A few minutes later the debriefing was wrapped up expertly by the faculty member. Another scenario ensued with a new group of residents and again, unplanned, something funny happened. Again laughter, then back to work, then the end. Debriefing commenced. During the second debriefing led to a discussion of how cyanide poisoning interacts with cellular metabolic pathways of the P450 cytochrome system and the therapeutics that should be considered to save the patient’s life. During the conversation a few light hearted comments by residents created more laughing.shutterstock_261594212a

I sat back thinking….. this is really fun…….There they are dressed in their tevas and shorts…..Learning of all things…… imagine that. This is truly patient-centric simulation. Innovative education occurring in a comfortable atmosphere helping these future emergency physicians perfect their diagnostic, therapeutic and leadership skills. They don’t need to be in scrubs, shirts and ties or wearing hospital badges to optimize this learning opportunity. They are not going to show up to work in the hospital wearing shorts and tevas. They are professionals. You know what? They are in fact adult learners being treated as adults.

I was a bite envious of my faculty colleagues having creating this amazingly relaxed environment where the residents felt comfortable to speak up, right or wrong in front of each other and faculty members alike.  In fact they were encouraged to explore during the cases. And they were learning. Learning new concepts or at least reviewing topics and learning objectives that were appropriate for their training program.

Guys and gals dressed as if they were going to a picnic, learning from each other, laughing and feeling free to explore and demonstrate their knowledge, skills and attitudes for the purpose of improving. Were they not taking it seriously? Cytochrome P450 and conduction aberrancies sure sounded serious to me, as did the discussion of teamwork and leadership.

Sometimes I think we can easily take ourselves too seriously in the simulation world. While I would be the first to argue there are times to do just that, I am reminded that there are times when it is not the case. People seem to be so caught up in defining rules of how things should and shouldn’t be done in simulation encounters that sometimes I observe huge opportunities to find new and interesting ways in which we can engage learners in their prime. I think that these faculty members new their participants well and designed amazing learning opportunities for them that included some of the power of simulation.

After all, we are not trying to simulate reality, we are trying to use simulation to create a milieu that will enhance our ability to carry out learning and assessment objectives that will eventually influence the care that is delivered by the healthcare system.

It was a great day for me, simulation and especially for future patients!

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August 18, 2015 · 2:56 am

Great Debriefing Should Stimulate Active Reflection

shutterstock_284271476_aDebriefing in simulation as well as after clinical events is a common method of continuing the learning process through helping participants garner insight from their participation in the activity. It is postulated and I believe, part of the power of this “conversation” when call debriefing is when the participant engages in active reflection. The onus is on the debriefer to create an environment where active reflection occurs.

One of the most effective ways to achieve this goal is through questions. When participants are asked questions regarding the activity being debriefed it forces them to replay the scenario or activity in their mind. I find it helpful to begin with rather open-ended broader questions for two reasons. The first is to ensure the participant(s) are ready to proceed. Secondly asking broader questions at the beginning such as “Can you give me a recap of what you just experienced?” Helps to force the participant to think about the activity in a longitudinal way. Gradually the questions become much more specific to allow the participant to understand cause and effect relationships between their performance in the activity and the outcomes of the case.

Another thing to consider is that when debriefing multiple people simultaneously, when a recollection of the activity is being recalled by one participant, the other participants are actively thinking about their own recognition of said activity. Thus active reflection is again triggered. It is quite natural for the other participants to not only be thinking about the activity, but actively forming their own thoughts in a comparison/contrast type of cognitive activity. During this period they are comparing their own recollection of the activity with the one of the person answering the initial question.

Question should be focused in a way that the debriefer is controlling the conversation through a structured pathway that allows the learning objectives to be met. Further, when one develops good debriefing habits through the use of questioning it limits the possibility of the debriefing converting into a ”mini – lecture”.

I believe the Structured and Supported debriefing model created by my colleague Dr. John O’Donnell along with collaborators, provides the best framework by which to structure the debriefing. His use of the GAS mnemonic has effectively allowed the model to be introduced to both novice and expert debriefers alike and facilitate an easily learned structured framework into their debriefing work. We have been able to successfully introduce this model across many cultures and at least five different languages and have had significant success.

Worksheets, or job-aids with some example questions that parallel the learning objectives can be written on such tools prior to the scenario commencement. Supplementing the job aid with additional notes during the performance of the scenario can be helpful to recall the important points of discussion at the time of debriefing, and the preformed questions can serve as gentle reminders to the debriefer on topics that must be covered to achieve a successful learning outcome.

So a challenge to you is the next time you conduct a debriefing be thinking in the back of your mind how can I best force my participants to engage in active reflection of the activity that is bring debriefed. In addition, I would recommend that you practice debriefing as often as you can! Debriefing is an activity that improves over time with experience and deliberate practice.

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June 30, 2014 · 10:22 pm

Feedback – More Than Just Debriefing

EKG_Feedback

Too often in the designs of scenarios for simulation there is a lack of attention to the fact that there are many forms of feedback that occurs during a simulation than the debriefing. Debriefing is certainly an important part of any learning encounter, but in reality represents only one type of feedback.

As you think about sources of feedback I ask you to be both creative and attentive. I like to think of feedback in two broad categories, intrinsic and extrinsic. The latter being the more commonly thought of mechanisms such as debriefings, video reviews, and simulator log file reviews etc. with the former being the topic of this post.

What I find to be of significant interest as it related to the design of scenarios is the feedback that occurs intrinsically. That is clues, or changes that occur during the scenarios that are available to the participant to incorporate in their understanding of how their decisions, treatments, or lack thereof, are affecting the statues of the patient.

Many of you might be saying, what are you talking about???? Ha!!! Now on to my favorite part which is providing concrete examples to help explain myself further.  Let’s say you are simulating a pelvic fracture case with hypotension and shock. The vitals’ of the high technology simulator that you may be using for the case would likely show tachycardia and hypotension etc. Now lets say the participant(s) place a pelvic binding device and give a unit of blood. You may include changes in the vitals appearing on the monitor that indicated that there was mild to moderate improvement of the patient. Perhaps the tachycardia would decrease and the blood pressure may improve over a set period of time.

During the design process of the scenario many people may create the changes in the vitals thinking they are mimicking reality of what may occur.  More importantly I think those involved in the design of the scenario should realize that the changes in the vitals referred to above are a source of important intrinsic feedback. The participants should be able to make the observations and decide they are helping the patient to improve.

This can be powerful feedback that links together successful performance with particular behaviors or decisions that were made. It is self-discovery, it will help to guide further care and decisions if the scenario continues. If the designer of the scenarios recognizes this intrinsic feedback in the design phases, additional creative solutions can be implemented to reinforce the learning.

While my pelvic fracture example shows a positive change tin the patient based on correct actions, the converse example could be true if incorrect care is being rendered. Consider that if you have a heart attack case with hypotension and the patient is administered aspirin and nitroglycerin. You would likely worsen the shock from a physiological perspective. Seeing this change will provide intrinsic feedback to the learners(s).

This is not to say that it all has to do with fancy feedback from high technology simulators. The same could be accomplished with showing a worsening EKG on paper if treatment is incorrect or delayed, or conversely showing and improving EKG for the right treatment given within the appropriate time.

Approaching feedback from a deliberate perspective can be helpful in reinforcing learning. It should be recognized as a design tool and carefully integrated into the core deign of any scenario. Debriefing can be linked to these feedback areas in the scenario. This can provide valuable links or areas ripe for discussion to assist in accomplishing the learning objectives.

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