Fernández-Alcántara Manuel, Escribano Silvia, Juliá-Sanchis Rocío, Castillo-López Ana, Pérez-Manzano Antonio, Macur M, Kalender-Smajlović Sedina, García-Sanjuán Sofía, Cabañero-Martínez María José
Department of Health Psychology, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Alicante, Alicante, Spain.
Institute of Health and Biomedical Research of Alicante, Alicante, Spain.
JMIR Med Educ. 2025 May 6;11:e63082. doi: 10.2196/63082.
Quality clinical care is supported by effective patient-centered communication. Health care professionals can improve their communication skills through simulation-based training, but our knowledge about virtual simulation and its effectiveness and use in training health professionals and students is still growing rapidly.
The objective of this study was to review the current academic literature to identify and evaluate the virtual simulation tools used to train communication skills in health care students and professionals.
This review was carried out in June 2023 by collecting data from the MEDLINE/PubMed and Web of Science electronic databases. Once applicable studies were identified, we recorded data related to type of technology used, learning objectives, degree of learning autonomy, outcomes, and other details.
We found 35 articles that had developed and/or applied a virtual environment for training communication skills aimed at patients, in which 24 different learning tools were identified. Most had been developed to independently train communication skills in English, either generally or in the specific context of medical history (anamnesis) interviews. Many of these tools used a virtual patient that looked like a person and had the ability to vocally respond. Almost half of the tools analyzed allowed the person being trained to respond orally using natural language. Of note, not all these studies described the technology they had used in detail.
Many different learning tools with very heterogeneous characteristics are being used for the purposes of communication skills training. Continued research will still be required to develop virtual tools that include the most advanced features to achieve high-fidelity simulation training.
优质的临床护理依赖于有效的以患者为中心的沟通。医疗保健专业人员可以通过基于模拟的培训提高他们的沟通技巧，但我们对虚拟模拟及其在培训医疗专业人员和学生方面的有效性和应用的了解仍在迅速增长。
本研究的目的是回顾当前的学术文献，以识别和评估用于培训医护学生和专业人员沟通技巧的虚拟模拟工具。
本综述于2023年6月进行，通过从MEDLINE/PubMed和科学网电子数据库收集数据。一旦确定了适用的研究，我们记录了与所使用技术的类型、学习目标、学习自主性程度、结果及其他细节相关的数据。
我们发现35篇文章开发和/或应用了针对患者的沟通技巧培训虚拟环境，其中识别出24种不同的学习工具。大多数工具是为独立培训英语沟通技巧而开发的，无论是一般沟通技巧还是在病史（问诊）访谈的特定背景下。这些工具中有许多使用了看起来像人的虚拟患者，并且能够进行语音回应。几乎一半的分析工具允许接受培训的人使用自然语言进行口头回应。值得注意的是，并非所有这些研究都详细描述了他们所使用的技术。
许多具有非常不同特征的不同学习工具正被用于沟通技巧培训目的。仍需要持续研究来开发包含最先进功能的虚拟工具，以实现高保真模拟培训。
