Preparing future healthcare professionals: Role-play and simulation in TeamSTEPPS training

Background: In contemporary healthcare, effective communication among healthcare team members is vital for enhancing patient safety and care delivery outcomes. The Joint Commission has identified communication breakdowns as a major factor in sentinel events. Interprofessional education (IPE) is a key strategy for equipping future healthcare professionals with teamwork and communication skills. Team Strategies and Tools to Enhance Performance and Patient Safety (TeamSTEPPS) is an established IPE program developed to improve team performance and patient safety through improved communication skills. This article introduces an innovative method for teaching TeamSTEPPS to interprofessional students at a large public university. Methods: The study involved 466 students from various health occupations and compared participation in a role-play session prior to simulation versus simulation without role-play. Results: In all participating students, a positive attitude was observed on attitudes toward teamwork. Students who participated in role-play before simulation reported higher confidence in using TeamSTEPPS tools. Conclusion: Role-play prior to simulation can be a strategy to enrich the instructional design to teach TeamSTEPPS tools to a large, diverse group of interprofessional students.