Abstract
Interprofessional simulation based education (SBE) improves core clinical skills and team training in obstetrics and gynaecology. In this innovative study, the introduction of an undergraduate interprofessional SBE program for teaching obstetrics and gynaecology skills in India was evaluated. The study attempted to evaluate the feasibility and benefit of the interprofessional skills training workshop in obstetrics and gynaecology, which was introduced for medical and midwifery students in a secondary level hospital in India. The program focuses on improving “hands-on” clinical skills and can be explained by the “skills acquisition theory”. Using a survey, participants rated relevance, pitch and confidence (on a 5-point Likert scale) and described the contextualisation and teaching of core clinical skills through the workshop using free-text. Descriptive analysis of quantitative Likert scale responses and thematic analysis of the free-text data was conducted and themes identified. Ninety-five medical and midwifery students attended the inaugural workshop, in a low-resource setting. The clinical experience in obstetrics and gynaecology across both groups was minimal, neither were they exposed to any prior SBE. Both health professional groups found the workshop useful, relevant and improved their confidence in performing vaginal examination and births. The key theme, which emerged from qualitative analysis, was “getting hands-on” experience. Other themes included learning by simulation without clinical time constraints, retaining the ability to make mistakes, bridging theory to practice, valuing interprofessional experience and ensuring equal learning opportunities for all participating professional groups. The advantages of interprofessional SBE, for medical and midwifery students, are reproducible in a low-resource setting, and may be be helpful for learning intimate clinical examination, obstetric procedures and team training.
Highlights
Acquisition of clinical skills is important for undergraduate medical students during their training in obstetrics and gynaecology
Similar findings have been reported when simulation was used in educating midwifery students, where it can assist in the development of integrated and global clinical skills [7]
The student groups were aged with a median age of years for medical students and years for midwifery students
Summary
Acquisition of clinical skills is important for undergraduate medical students during their training in obstetrics and gynaecology. This experience is mostly acquired from placements on birth units and clinics where students learn about performing obstetric examination and births. Simulation based education (SBE) provides students with “scaffold learning” to develop skills and competence in examining patients [3]. It bridges the gap between “theory to practice”, as knowledge learnt in a classroom can be practiced on simulators prior to real patients. If interprofessional education (IPE) can be implemented, it can increase students’ exposure to other professions and allow them to develop unprejudiced impressions of other students before they graduate and develop their professional identities in their respective workplace [9]
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