Practices of clinical interview simulation and debriefing with medical students

Abstract

Effective communication in the clinical relationship between physicians and patients improves basic aspects in the health relationship such as the correct diagnosis of the professional or the patient’s adherence to treatment. Communication skills facilitate this process. Clinical simulation and debriefing are two useful tools for training in communication skills. This work presents a teaching experience consisting of conducting simulated interviews with medical students in Spain. Methods: All the students of the 2nd year of the Medicine Degree of the Public University of Navarra (N = 60) participated in eight simulated interviews in which the students played the role of physician with patients simulated by actors. A debriefing was carried out after each interview, both in groups of 10 students. The identification of the main skills learned was evaluated, through an individual self-report of the practices; moreover, their evaluation of the activity was obtained through an evaluation questionnaire. Results: The students reflected among their conclusions the main concepts analysed in the practices, reflecting a high level of learning. Likewise, the evaluation showed high satisfaction, as well as a high self-perception of personal learning. The active role of all medical students playing the role of physician and the debriefing in small groups seem to be useful for the acquisition of communication skills and to improve the self-perception of efficacy of Medicine students in simulating clinical interviews with debriefing.