SimUniversity at a distance: a descriptive account of a team-based remote simulation competition for health professions students

Abstract

Background SimUniversity competition is an innovative Society in Europe for Simulation Applied to Medicine (SESAM) initiative which has existed since 2014, with the aim of creating opportunities for undergraduate healthcare students to take part in a formative educational experience on an international platform. The main educational focus is on promoting non-technical skills such as leadership, situation awareness, decision making, communication, and assertiveness, but also clinical reasoning within a team. In preparation for the 2021 virtual conference, the team designed a new methodology to meet the same mission, and yet be offered remotely. Main text In this article, we describe the way in which we transformed the SimUniversity competition activity from face to face to a remote simulation. We relied on Zoom as the main communication technology to enable the distance component and followed the key elements of pre-briefing, simulation, and debriefing with the students being onsite together in one location and the faculty and simulator technologists in distant locations. Thirty-eight medical and nursing students formed 8 teams from 7 different countries. Two participating teams were based in Germany and one in Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Romania, Portugal, and Syria. Each team consisted of between 4 and 5 members and was self-selected to consist of either medical students alone or medical and nursing students together. The SimUniversity faculty team was composed of 5 physician educators, one nurse educator, one paramedic simulation technologist, and one industry simulation technologist. The faculty members facilitated each simulation synchronously in Zoom, while being based in different geographical locations within Europe (Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands) and the Middle East (Qatar and Lebanon). Conclusion We conclude that assuming there is access to adequate internet connectivity and minimal technical setup, conducting a remote simulation with virtual debriefing is achievable in supporting team-based learning, particularly when learners and/or faculty members are in distant locations. While the authors do not recommend this method to be superior to a face-to-face experience, we propose this model to be an alternative method to consider when educators are faced with imposed restrictions such as what we faced during the COVID-19 pandemic. We discuss lessons learned and highlight other potential benefits that this method may provide, to consider even when the restrictions are lifted.