ESCAPE the Boring Lecture: Tips and Tricks on Building Puzzles for Medical Education Escape Rooms

Abstract

Escape rooms in medical education are a novel, game-based learning approach for teaching medical topics. In these escape rooms, learners complete a sequential series of medical-themed puzzles leading them to “escape” a specific story. Designing puzzles can be anxiety-provoking and may be the gatekeeper for educators in medicine to create their own escape rooms. Though there have been publications on the importance and methods of building a healthcare-themed-escape room, there is a gap in the literature on designing puzzles to teach specific learning objectives successfully. In this Scholarly Perspective, the authors share puzzle ideas and support tools and use Bloom's taxonomy as the framework to teach educators how to design challenging and engaging escape room puzzles.

Effectiveness of “Escape Room” Educational Technology in Nurses’ Education: A Systematic Review

“…This implies that systems capable of collecting the perceptions and experiences of the participants should always be included in the design of the ER games since in this way key information can be obtained to identify aspects that can be improved [ 8 ]. Therefore, debriefing is a necessary element to be included in ER games [ 8 , 35 ], with some authors going so far as to state that in healthcare simulation, “debriefing is just as or even more important than the simulation” [ 36 ]. Some of the studies included in this review included various debriefing systems for this purpose [ 19 , 22 , 25 ], although without uniformity regarding the method used for this purpose.…”

Effectiveness of “Escape Room” Educational Technology in Nurses’ Education: A Systematic Review.

“…This implies that systems capable of collecting the perceptions and experiences of the participants should always be included in the design of the ER, since in this way key information can be obtained to identify aspects that can be improved [8]. Therefore, debriefing is a necessary element to be included in ER [8,37], with some authors going so far as to state that in healthcare simulation, "debriefing is just as or even more important than the simulation" [38]. Some of the studies included in this review included various debriefing systems for this purpose [20,23,26], although without uniformity regarding the method used for this purpose.…”

“…Similarly, it is also desirable to assess participant satisfaction with the activity [8,37]. However, many of the studies included in this review did not evaluate it or did so only superficially [15,21].…”

“…Elevated anxiety levels have been reported in nursing students related to clinical laboratory practicums and simulations [41,42]. Although more research addressing how ER affect students' anxiety levels is needed [43], in the design of ER it is always imperative to guarantee a sense of safety among participants [37].…”