New trends in medical education. The clinical skills laboratories.

A clinical skills laboratory or center is a facility in which students, physicians, nurses and other health care professionals learn clinical, communication and information technology skills to a specified level of competence prior to or coordinated with direct patient contact. The purpose of the clinical skill laboratory is to support the acquisition, maintenance and enhancement of the clinical skills of students in health care professions. Within this non-threatening environment, patient volunteers, simulated patients, mannequins and information technology are employed to provide hands-on learning experiences for the practice of the essential clinical skills. The skills laboratory helps to ensure that all students have necessary learning opportunities and appropriate assessment and feedback before approaching real patients. As more and more schools integrate skills laboratories into their curricula, it is important to review this new trend, to introduce the reader to its nature, factors that led to its development, advantages and problems related to its implementation. This review will also suggest some guidelines that may help in overcoming the implementation problems.