Enhancing interprofessional teaming and communication through a standardized patient tele-health simulation

Telehealth is becoming a common healthcare service. To address the need for training in this area during the pandemic, we developed a learning activity wherein learners demonstrate interprofessional communication and teamwork via a simulated educational telehealth encounter. This learning activity includes over 355 learners from six professional programs including: clinical laboratory sciences, health administration, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and respiratory therapy. The objectives of the simulation were to demonstrate an effective huddle, assign a leader, inclusion of each profession in creating the care plan, and use of closed-loop communication. An implicit objective is for the learners to include the patient’s feedback in the care plan. Evaluation of the simulation was two-fold. First, faculty used an online observational tool during the simulation to assess the learner team performance during the event. Second, learners completed a satisfaction survey after the simulation. The observational tool revealed that the majority of the teams performed at the “better than average” or “excellent” range in all TeamSTEPPS® domains as defined by the Performance Assessment for Communication and Teamwork Evaluation tool (PACT). A satisfaction survey was evaluated quantitatively for the Likert-scale questions and qualitatively using a content analysis of the open-ended question in the survey. Survey quantitative data showed the telehealth simulation was valuable, and qualitative data showed that learners perceived improved skills in Teamwork & Collaboration with increased confidence and comfort in working in interprofessional teams. • Learners perceived an improved competency in teamwork and collaboration. • Role development improved for learners who have less clinical teaming experience. • A standardized patient encouraged inclusion of the patient as a member of the team. • Tele-Sim environment encouraged focus on teamwork and communication.