Confidence-building in a collaborative, multidisciplinary mock page activity for fourth-year medical students

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Healthcare Communication
• Simulation-Based Learning

Background:

• Medical schools often lack traditional training in essential non-clinical skills.
• Mock paging activities simulate nurse-to-physician communication to build student confidence and competence.
• Previous studies showed benefits in smaller, specialty-specific settings.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the impact of a large-scale, multidisciplinary mock paging activity on graduating medical students' confidence and communication skills.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of this simulation across various medical specialties.
• To foster collaboration between medical and nursing students.

Main Methods:

• A mock paging activity was designed and implemented collaboratively by School of Medicine (SOM) and School of Nursing (SON) faculty.
• Medical students (n=420) completed pre- and post-activity surveys assessing confidence in communication, interaction with healthcare professionals, and patient management.
• Data were collected over two years for a large, diverse cohort of graduating medical students.

Main Results:

• A significant increase (30.4%, p <0.001) in general confidence was observed post-activity.
• Students reported enhanced confidence in receiving nursing communications, making phone-based clinical decisions, and using pagers.
• The activity proved effective for a large cohort entering diverse specialties.

Conclusions:

• This large-scale, specialty-non-specific mock paging activity effectively improved medical students' communication and confidence.
• The multidisciplinary approach enhanced preparedness for essential clinical interactions.
• Future work includes refining the activity based on feedback and incorporating interprofessional debriefing.