Development and Evaluation of Innovative and Practical Table-top Exercises Based on a Real Mass-Casualty Incident

The aim of this work was to develop a table-top exercise (TTX) program for mass-casualty incident (MCI) response based on a real incident to evaluate the program.

The TTX program was developed based on the 8 TTX design steps. Convenience sampling was adopted to recruit recently graduated physicians in China. After the TTX training, the participants completed a self-designed questionnaire, as well as the Simulation Design Scale (SDS) and Educational Practices in Simulation Scale (EPSS).

In total, 148 valid questionnaires were collected. The difficulty score of the TTX program was 3.69 ± 0.8. The participants evaluated the program highly, with a score of 4.72 ± 0.54 out of 5. Both the SDS and the EPSS had average scores higher than 4.5. Guided reflection/feedback (M = 4.68, SD = 0.41) and fidelity (M =4.66, SD = 0.57) were the 2 highest-rated SDS subscales. For the EPSS, diverse ways of learning and collaboration were the 2 highest-rated subscales. Multivariate stepwise regression analysis showed that the participants' evaluations of the TTX training course were related to the EPSS score, the difficulty rating, the evaluation of the instructional props, and the degree of participant involvement (F = 24.385, P < 0.001).

A TTX program for MCIs was developed based on the 2014 Shanghai New Year Crush. The TTX kit is practical and sophisticated, and it provides an effective strategy for MCI training.