Distance assessment of counselling skills using virtual patients during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Background: Reports on using virtual patients to assess counselling skills is scarce. Aim: This paper describes the feasibility and acceptability of assessing patient counselling skills of pharmacy students using a virtual patient simulator. Description: In this innovative method, a high quality simulator ‘Virtual Patient Learning’ (VPL) was developed at Gulf Medical University (GMU) and was used to assess the counselling skills of 15 pharmacy graduate students. Counselling skills were measured using a four-domain scoring rubric of 1 to 5 marks followed by instant feedback for improvements. Student and faculty satisfaction scores were collected based on the feasibility and acceptability of the assessment method. Evaluation: The average counselling skills score for all students was 68.4 (85.5%) out of 80 (range 54-76), with a standard deviation of 5.8. The overall student agreement on the feasibility and acceptability of the assessment method was 92.8%; it was 100% agreement for faculty. Conclusion: The use of a high quality VPL simulator in assessing counselling skills was deemed feasible and acceptable for students and faculty. The assessment was repeated among 30 Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.) graduates with similar outcomes. The virtual counselling method will be used in the programme exit exams, as well as in students entering their experiential year. Further studies are required to assess its validity and reliability with more students.

Students’ and Examiners’ Experiences of Their First Virtual Pharmacy Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) in Australia during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…This was particularly useful for faculty members with children that require home schooling during the pandemic. Virtual OSCEs also provided greater ease in logistical and spatial requirements, which is often a limiting factor to face-to-face OSCEs [ 26 ]. Nevertheless, our virtual OSCE was conducted with multiple Zoom Meetings hosted concurrently.…”

Use of Face-to-Face Assessment Methods in E-Learning—An Example of an Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) Test

“…Alternatively, Thomas et al assessed the patient counseling skills of pharmacy students using a virtual patient simulator. It showed some advantages regarding financial and logistical aspects in comparison with the traditional OSCE, but the simulation itself brought out some fundamental limitations, particularly on the quality and types of virtual patients [16]. Nevertheless, the technology-driven OSCE assessment provides the opportunity to continue to create cohesive, interactive dialogues between pharmacy students and simulated patients, thereby leveraging students' confidence and their role in patient care in real-life situations.…”

Virtual patient simulation in pharmacy education: A systematic review

“…Six studies employed the Decision Simulation software, and two used MyDispense (Table II). Of the remaining 11 studies, seven used various simulation software (Warrior, OpenSimulator, Therasim, Virtual Patient for Geriatric Education Software, Unity3D, a pharmacal program, or Case Scenario/Critical Reader), and four did not include the description of the simulation software used (Cavaco & Madeira, 2012;Hussainy, Styles & Duncan, 2012;Mesquita et al, 2015;Thomas et al, 2021).…”