International Journal of Healthcare Simulation

Background:

Prior to 2021 within West Hertfordshire Healthcare Trust, mandatory simulation sessions were pre-allocated to foundation trainees. If sessions clashed with trainees’ schedules, trainees would be expected to liaise with simulation faculty to rearrange verbally or via email. This created a significant burden on the faculty as there was no dedicated administrator or time. Moreover, this caused trainee burden on those unable to attend, and a significant proportion did not re-book these sessions. This impacted the efficiency figures for the simulation centre. We aimed to have rigorous adherence to the schedule and wanted the simulation programme to be efficient and work to full capacity. Within this service improvement innovation, the objective was to establish a better method of booking trainees into simulation sessions aiming to alleviate the faculty burden and provide flexibility for the trainees.

Activity:

For the 2021–22 academic year, an online booking system for simulation was established. This was achieved using the Acorn 2 system. Trainees were then permitted to book a date that suited them for their mandatory training, and re-book if their commitments clashed with the booking schedule. This innovation removed the use of faculty as a medium for booking and rescheduling, freeing them to provide more simulation activities by alleviating this administrative burden. Datasets were compared between the 2020–21 and the 2021–22 academic year to determine the extent to which this innovation improved learner attendance within our simulation programme.

Results:

Within this study we found that overall, there was a greater level of attendance from trainees following implementation of the new system than prior to this. We found 6% more simulation sessions were attended (from 87% attendance 2020 – 2021 to 93% attendance 2021 – 2022), and of those not attended, 20% more were rescheduled compared with the previous system (from 41% in 2020 – 2021, to 61% in 2021–2022).

Conclusion:

It is evident from this innovation that a significant impact can be made on learner engagement when we allow trainees flexibility to self-determine their learning timeline. This is echoed within the literature, as adult learning theories emphasise learner led learning and learner driven orientation of their own learning narrative [1, 2]. By placing the onus on trainees, we de-burdened them of the stress of trying to re-allocate their clinical commitments whilst attributing greater accountability to the trainees. Overall, we believe this leads to greater faculty and trainee wellbeing and engagement in simulation-based learning.

References

1. Knowles, M. S. The Adult Learner: A Neglected Species (3rd Ed.). Houston, TX: Gulf Publishing; 1984.

2. Knowles, M. S. Andragogy in Action. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass; (1984).