Training with virtual patients in transcultural psychiatry: do the learners actually learn?

The rapid increase in the number of patients with diverse ethnic backgrounds and previous exposure to severe mental trauma dictates the need for improvement in the quality of transcultural psychiatric health care through the development of relevant and effective training tools. This study aimed to e...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of medical Internet research 2015-02, Vol.17 (2), p.e46-e46
Main Authors: Pantziaras, Ioannis, Fors, Uno, Ekblad, Solvig
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Clinical decision making
Clinical skills
Communication
Communication skills
Decision making
Educational Measurement
Ethnopsychology - education
Ethnopsychology - methods
Feedback
Female
Females
Gender
Health care management
Humans
Information Society
informationssamhället
Internet
Knowledge
Laboratories
Learning
Male
Males
Medical Informatics
Middle Aged
Occupational stress
Original Paper
Patient Simulation
Patients
Post traumatic stress disorder
Psychiatrists
Refugees
Simulated clients
Social psychiatry
Statistical analysis
Statistical significance
Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic - diagnosis
Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic - ethnology
Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic - therapy
Symptoms
Trauma
User-Computer Interface
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Summary:The rapid increase in the number of patients with diverse ethnic backgrounds and previous exposure to severe mental trauma dictates the need for improvement in the quality of transcultural psychiatric health care through the development of relevant and effective training tools. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of training with a virtual patient on the learner's knowledge of posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, clinical management, and basic communication skills. The authors constructed an interactive educational tool based on virtual patient methodology that portrayed a refugee with severe symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder and depression. A total of 32 resident psychiatrists tested the tool and completed a pre-interaction and post-interaction knowledge test, including skills, at the time and several weeks later. All of the participants (N=32) completed the pre-interaction and post-interaction test, and 26 (81%) of them completed the online follow-up test. The mean pre-interaction score was 7.44 (male: 7.08, female: 7.65, no statistical significance). The mean post-interaction score was 8.47, which was significantly higher (P
ISSN:1438-8871
1439-4456
1438-8871
DOI:10.2196/jmir.3497