The Effectiveness of Interactive Clinical Case Study Simulation (ICCSS) as a Teaching –Learning Tool in Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation

Introduction: Teaching in medicine should focus on enabling students to acquire knowledge and skill which translates in to best clinical outcomes. Class room based teachings or group discussions don’t impart principles of team work, coordination or decision making which is prudent in an emergency situation. Introduction of technology based teaching like simulation is the need of the hour in medical curriculum. Methodology: A total of 21 medical students trained in basic life support underwent an algorithm based class room lecture on shockable rhythm following which they were randomly divided in to 2 groups, 10 students were allocated to Non-simulation and 11 in HPS (Simulation) group. Non Simulation group had one ‘hands-on session’ based on conventional CPR mannequin for one clinical case scenario based on shockable rhythm. HPS group underwent one ‘inter-active clinical case scenario’ simulation (ICCSS) using human patient simulator for the same scenario based on shockable rhythm. A 21 point OSCE developed based on AHA guidelines was used to test each group.. Each student was scored based on the number of successfully completed procedures. Results: Data was expressed as Mean+SD or mode. Chi square test or Mann whitney U test was used to compare data and student t test was used to compare quantitative data. P values less than 0.05 was taken to be significant. In the HPS group 95% of the core skills were met when compared to 62% in non simulation group. There was significant difference in performance of practical steps and steps that required team effort. The HPS group was found to be better coordinated.