A Review of Simulation Pedagogy Past and Present; and The Experiences at One Center During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: Simulation based education is defined as a series of structured activities that represent real or potential situations in real world practice. During the Covid-19 pandemic, teaching methods for MBBS students which have been developed for decades, but remained at the fringes of medical training, like teaching with simulators, suddenly came into the fore. Hence, this remains the right time to update ourselves with knowledge about simulator use in education, as we can foresee that this teaching modality will continue to play a large role in medicine pedagogy in the years to come. Methods: Published papers on the subject were reviewed from Pub Med, Scopus, Google Scholar, ResearchGate (range 2008 to 2023) sources. Feedback was obtained from both teachers and students using a simple questionnaire. While teachers gave a singularly positive feed of their simulation-based teaching experience during the pandemic years, student feedback was a little mixed. Almost all students felt that the simulation-based learning instructions were extremely helpful, but the degree of relevance they felt to their clinical years varied. Conclusion: Simulation based teaching has come a long way, especially over the past few decades. Present day tactics use computer screen-based scenarios with step-by-step history taking, clinical examination modules (integrated with hi-fidelity mannequins) and management methods which can lead to cure, complications or death. Students can learn through missteps and can correct their responses. As the healthcare industry rapidly evolves technologically, it will increasingly become dependent on simulation as a teaching method in all levels of medical training in the interests of patient safety and student proficiency.