Online medical education tool aspires to improve patient interactions in challenging situations

Drexel University College of Medicine has developed an online medical education program to help healthcare professionals hone those skills in simulated interactions with patients and their families.

Although the goal is to improve performance by physicians and other healthcare professionals, it is also designed to help hospitals boost patient satisfaction scores, which impact Medicare reimbursement. This is one trend in healthcare that startups are increasingly addressing.

Dr. Christof Daetwyler of Drexel University College of Medicine will use the $100,000 he received from the University City Science Center QED Proof of Concept award to fund a pilot program with a well-known hospital next year and build a company around the technology.

In an interview with MedCity News, Daetwyler said one of Drexel’s collaboration partners is the Gift of Life donor program in Philadelphia, which licensed the technology.

A prototype of the technology was developed in 2002 at the Technology in Medical Education group at Drexel. It was used as a video conferencing tool to help medical students prep for the Objective Structured Clinical Examinations through simulated patient interactions.

Since then, technology advancements have made it easier to bring the platform online. User interactions with simulated patients are recorded online. Users get structured feedback on performance. They can also access videos that offer examples of best practice. In addition to organ donation and breaking bad news, it also includes modules on how to broach other difficult situations such as smoking cessation.

A separate joint venture between the College of Medicine and the American Academy on Communication in Healthcare, Doc.Com, produced 41 modules to improve communication skills.

The company’s approach also helps address the physician shortage, which is projected to worsen as Obamacare extends healthcare access to millions of people.

Several other health IT companies are taking different approaches to medical training using simulators. Shadow Health and Kognito Interactive have focused on developing patient simulator tools to improve patient and physician communication. SimplySim developed a way to train physicians to properly use a stethoscope and CaseNetwork developed a training tool to reduce readmissions. The idea is to provide more meaningful interactions to improve adherence and so that healthcare professionals better understand their patients’ needs.
Source : Med City News