Enhancing Patient Safety and Quality of Care: Study Protocol for a Simulation-based Team Training Intervention Trial

Background:

Effective teamwork and quality care are crucial for patient safety overall. Simulation-based team training offers a valuable approach to improving communication, coordination, and decision-making among healthcare professionals, leading to better outcomes and a safer healthcare environment. By evaluating the effectiveness of this training method, the project aims to contribute to the continuous improvement of healthcare delivery.

Hypothesis: Implementation of simulation-based team training in pediatric departments will lead to improved teamwork, communication, and coordination among healthcare professionals, resulting in enhanced patient outcomes and a safer healthcare environment.

Setup: From April 2023 to April 2024 a simulation-based training program will be implemented. The intervention group consists of healthcare professionals working as physicians or nurses in four pediatric departments. The intervention entails increasing the quantity of simulation-based team training within the intervention group. Additionally, measures to enhance and support simulation will be introduced within the intervention group.

Concurrently, another four pediatric departments will serve as a control group, in which no intervention will be implemented.

Both groups consist of approximately 600 healthcare professionals, contributing to a total of 1,200 participants included in this project.

Data collection:

Registration of simulation: The simulation facilitator responsible for each session completes a brief web-based questionnaire made readily accessible from all platforms by QR-code. Data includes Regional ID (unique personal identifier), gender, age, profession, simulation duration, and content, as well as learning goals.

Outcome measures include 1) patient safety culture, 2) rate of sick leave among healthcare professionals, 3) Apgar score, and 4) an intervention cost-benefit analysis.