Building patient safety culture by using interprofessional simulation with nursing, paramedic, and emergency telecommunication students: A mixed-methods research study

Purpose: Healthcare, allied health, and social service professionals have an essential role in fostering student’s attitudes, skills, and behaviours that support safe care. The aim of this study was to offer new insights into assessments of interprofessional education by evaluating student’s perceptions of an interprofessional simulation experience.

Principal results: Teams comprised of nursing (n=81), paramedic (n=38), and emergency telecommunication students (n=11) were involved in a high acuity simulated scenario involving a client with a high-risk pregnancy and her family. Both quantitative and qualitative data were evaluated. The findings suggest that the students found the experience important in developing communication, teamwork and collaboration skills that are essential for effective handover communication and patient safety.

Major conclusions: Based on thematic coding, 4 themes emerged from the data: communication and collaboration in teamwork; roles and responsibilities, and leadership; patient-centred care and safety; and emotional dynamics and professional growth. Emergency telecommunication students noted ‘feedback being constructive and timely’ as the most important in the simulation design while nursing and paramedic students rated ‘opportunity to obtain feedback from teacher to build knowledge to another level’ as the most important. Students wanted earlier and more frequent interprofessional education experiences. Areas that students identified as needing more clarity included role clarification and collaborative leadership.

Key Words: patient safety, interprofessional education, simulation, health professional students, handover communication, mixed methods

Please find Quantitative Survey Results for the Simulation Design & Simulation Design Importance Rating Tools.
An ANOVA was completed to compare the mean scores for this tool by program.