What’s the deal with virtual reality? And why is it making such big waves?
Maybe it’s time to pick up surfing and come along for the ride…but how do you know it’s the right way to go?
Start at the beginning – read on for the core benefits of using VR in nursing education:
- Psychological safety
- Autonomous practice
- Repeatability
- Flexibility
- Time & cost savings
Psychological safety
It’s imperative. We know how important it is to feel safe in a learning environment – it can help people speak freely about mistakes and learn from them without fear of retaliation or judgment.
And how else will we learn from our errors if we don’t feel safe talking about them?
For an environment to be psychologically safe for students, they need to feel safe learning, contributing, and challenging or voicing concerns.
In an immersive environment like VR, learners can feel safe in knowing that they cannot harm a patient and can make mistakes without dire or real-world consequences.
Of course, it is still impacted by the preparation and communication from faculty prior to and following simulation, but when standard principles of psychological safety are in effect, VR is a space for learners to practice autonomously and safely make mistakes as they learn.
Autonomy of practice
Like students in many other disciplines, they are limited in their ability to perform clinical skills in a real-world clinical setting.
Particularly in cases of emergency, students often must remain hands-off and observe while other, more skilled professionals handle the situation.
While observation is necessary for the learning process, students inevitably lack experience managing high-acuity situations.
As many clinical settings cannot guarantee specific experiences, students may go into practice knowing they may work with a patient with a condition they’ve only seen in a didactic setting.
While causes of errors can be complex, it’s imperative that new nurses feel confident in their fundamental skill sets, particularly considering that new nurses are involved in about 50% of medical errors.
In virtual reality scenarios, learners assume the role of practitioners, and they are alone in charge of observing, analyzing, interpreting, and intervening in managing patient care.
For many students, this provides a much-needed and often rare opportunity to practice in a way that reflects the reality of nurses’ responsibility while ensuring patient safety.
Learning VR for clinical practice can positively impact their knowledge, critical thinking, and clinical decision-making skills.
Students themselves report feeling “empowered and” encouraged” after VR sessions, with others recommending that “you can “improve massively from VR.”
When “students can practice in simulation more often and autonomously, they can walk away feeling competent, confident, and more prepared for nursing practice.”
Repeatability
We all know the saying “practice makes perfect” – and there’s a lot of truth to that!
Anyone who ascribes to the 10,000-hour rule will tell you. It takes a lot of practice to become an expert at anything.
So why aren’t there more opportunities for repeated practice in simulation? It stands to reason that more practice means better preparation for clinical practice.
There’s no two ways about it—putting together a day of simulation is a long and arduous process. It requires significant planning, scheduling, and coordination, not to mention the setup, maintenance, and resetting following one simulation.
Physical simulation, such as manikin-based or standardized patients, is a critical part of learning and applying new skills as a nursing student, and it’s not going anywhere.
When considering VR simulation, however, it’s easy to see why so many people cite ‘repeatability’ as a main driver for incorporating it into a nursing curriculum.
Nursing students with access to virtual reality simulations have unlimited opportunities to practice.
Not only that, but learners receive immediate, personalized, and evidence-based feedback following their VR simulations in OMS. They review that information, reflect on it, and immediately put it back into practice.
In fact, learners themselves have highlighted personalized feedback and the ability to repeat scenarios as key benefits of virtual reality training, which drives critical thinking between simulations.
It’s safe to assume nursing students are there because they care about helping people, so offering them unlimited opportunities to practice their skills before they have to use them with real people is a game-changer.
Flexibility
Speaking of “game-changers,” VR scenarios offer a means to practice in simulation anywhere, anytime. It’s not a novel idea, but it’s amazing how impactful it can be to know there are more than one or two opportunities to apply your skills in a simulated environment.
It’s easy to see the value in a VR headset’s portability alone, but the ability to complete virtual simulations on a laptop adds an entirely new dimension to the mix.
Take it from the folks at the University of East London, who “have a view of using technology to move us forward” and who said that “the fact that [OMS] has both on-screen and VR headset, for us, was a game changer for the future.”
When students have access to a platform that enables them to truly practice anytime and anywhere, there’s far more opportunity for truly deliberate practice and self-reflection.
With the ability to practice in the classroom, with a facilitator, or independently at home, institutions can more easily scale simulation to accommodate any number of students.
This inherent function of the OMS platform also alleviates some of the administrative burden on faculty and staff, significantly decreasing the time and cost of simulation.
Time & cost savings
If you could put a number to it, how many hours would you be happy to save in your simulation lab?
10, 20, 50 hours? What about getting 200 hours of time back? The folks at the University of Lincoln know all about that since they began using VR simulations to facilitate their OSCE assessments.
They’re not the only ones realizing the benefits of VR simulation—for their learners, for their faculty, and even for their return on investment.
In fact, according to one study, VR simulation education requires 22% less time than physical simulation education and is 40% less expensive.
When an institution sees a 74% reduction in staffing time and estate costs, that’s something to consider.
Virtual reality simulations can bolster students’ learning and enhance and modernize a nursing curriculum. While this article has only scratched the surface, there are loads of benefits to be had when it comes to virtual reality and clinical simulation.
Want to learn more about virtual reality in the nursing curriculum? Check out this blog on curriculum mapping, aligning VR with your curriculum.