Problem Identification and Needs Assessment for a Universal Surgical Simulation Educational Fellowship Curriculum

Simulation-based training is a critical adjunct to clinical medicine, and it has grown exponentially in academic and community healthcare settings in recent decades. The expansion is multifactorial, and the proliferation has resulted in the need for well-informed, well-trained simulation educators and leaders. The increased demand has driven the growth of accredited surgical simulation fellowships and formal surgical education qualifications. However, there are currently no standardized curricula for these fellowship programs. We aimed to perform a problem identification and needs assessment to develop a surgical simulation fellow curriculum.

A mixed-methods needs assessment was performed. Problem identification and general needs assessment were conducted during regular Association of Surgical Education (ASE) Simulation Committee meetings. The general needs assessment involved a scoping literature review to identify papers on existing longitudinal simulation curricula, with searches of PubMed, EMBASE, and Web of Science. The targeted needs assessment involved a focus group interview of surgical simulation fellows, and the investigative team performed a thematic analysis.

Key stakeholders of surgical simulation fellowships identified no standard curriculum for these fellows. They identified that a collaborative national project to develop a curriculum accessible to surgical simulation fellows could enhance the learning experience. The scoping literature review identified 258 studies, 7 full articles, and 3 articles meeting inclusion criteria, demonstrating a paucity of literature on curricula for simulation educational fellows. The general and targeted needs assessment informed the development of suggested modules for the surgical simulation curriculum, and the first draft of proposed modules was discussed with the ASE Board; feedback was incorporated, and a final list of modules was produced.

Through Kern's steps of problem identification and needs assessment, we describe the structure for a novel national innovative curriculum to educate surgical simulation fellows and those interested in surgical simulation education.