A Cost-Effective Approach to Simulation-Based Team Training in Obstetrics

摘要

Many larger facilities regularly stage obstetric drills in modern simulation departments equipped with expensive simulators. Despite lacking these resources, we wanted to provide effective simulation training at our rural hospital. A team of clinicians and educators developed a cost-effective and time-efficient simulation drill for nurses, which included both a didactic review and a simulation day. The drill included obstetric providers and incorporated scenarios for shoulder dystocia, neonatal resuscitation and postpartum hemorrhage. This was a successful multidiscipli-nary learning experience that was high in creativity and teamwork, but low in cost. Andrighetti, Knestrick, Marowitz, Martin, and Engstrom (2012) tout the benefits of simulation, explaining that participants are able "to experience the management of a complication that they may never encounter during their student clinical experiences" (p. 55). Recently, students attending a hospital-based diploma nursing program in our area were given the opportunity to participate in a postpartum hemorrhage simulation. Implementation was a collaborative effort between the school's nurse educators and an experienced obstetric nurse who practices in a high-volume, high-acuity institution. Students' evaluations of the program were positive, with favorable comments conveying excitement that this kind of learning would now be integrated into their curriculum. When word traveled, as it so easily does in a small facility, to the labor and delivery (L&D) unit of the affiliated hospital, both the staff nurses and nurse manager expressed their interest in a similar learning scenario. The nurses' desire for an emergency drill prompted the development of a simulation to allow for a realistic and pertinent learning experience.