Teaching Medical Students How to Suture: Standard Simulation vs in Situ

March 11, 2019 updated by: Memorial University of Newfoundland
The purpose of this project is to compare in situ simulation with standard lab simulation. To do this, 30 pre-clinical medical students will be randomized into the lab or ER and taught how to suture a simple laceration. To do this, a synthesized 'skin' will be placed over a volunteer's arm and will have an incision of a predetermined length.

Study Overview

Status

Withdrawn

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

For this study, 30 first and second year students will be equally randomized to either a standard simulation lab or the ER department to learn the skill of suturing. These students will not have any knowledge of suturing prior to this study. Each group will have 15 students. Each student will be given access to the same suturing learning video. They will each attempt 15 sutures on a lab generated skin placed over a volunteer's arm. Each incision length will be predetermined and of the same length. The student will have the opportunity to re-watch the video in between each suture attempt. The volunteer will record the student's number of attempts and whether or not they had to review the video. The idea behind this, is that students should began to plateau with their learning after about 8-9 attempts and most will no longer require the video beyond that.After the 15 attempts, the student will immediately practice 6 sutures on a second skin over the volunteer's arm, again of a predetermined incision length. At this point the students will only be allowed to practice the suturing skill and will not have access to the learning video. At this point, the student's hands will be video recorded to assess the accuracy of the skill.One week after the learning session, regardless of the environment they initially learned in, the student will be brought to the ER and again allowed to practice 6 sutures on a simulated skin placed over a volunteer's arm. The incision will be the same length as the incision in the previous practice session. Again, the student's hands will be video recorded while practicing the 6 sutures.Afterward, the student will be given a questionnaire regarding which environment they practiced in and how prepared they felt to practice in the insitu environment without learning aids.

Study Type

Interventional

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

  • Child
  • Adult
  • Older Adult

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Pre clinical medical students (year one or two)

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Medical students not in first or second year training
  • Extensive knowledge or background with suturing

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Single

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Simulation Lab
Other: Simulated Learning Environment
Intervention is the environment in which the medical student will learn to practice how to suture. The end goal is to determine the impact each environment has on their ability to learn the skill.
Other Names:
  • Simulation lab
  • ER in situ simulation
Experimental: ER in situ Simulation
Other: Simulated Learning Environment
Intervention is the environment in which the medical student will learn to practice how to suture. The end goal is to determine the impact each environment has on their ability to learn the skill.
Other Names:
  • Simulation lab
  • ER in situ simulation

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
How each simulated learning environment effects a student's ability to learn how to suture
Time Frame: 1 week
Each student will complete a post survey questionnaire after their attempt to suture in the ER department. This will help determine the impact and therefore, which environment was more conducive to learning how to suture.
1 week

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Memorial University of Newfoundland

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Chrystal Horwood, MD, Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

General Publications

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Anticipated)

April 1, 2018

Primary Completion (Anticipated)

May 1, 2018

Study Completion (Anticipated)

June 1, 2018

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

March 26, 2018

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

April 8, 2018

First Posted (Actual)

April 17, 2018

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

March 13, 2019

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

March 11, 2019

Last Verified

April 1, 2018

More Information

Terms related to this study

Keywords

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

Other Study ID Numbers

  • MUNChrystal

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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