Training Simulation to Teach Alcohol Screening and Brief Intervention

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Alcohol use disorders are common among primary care patients. They are also associated with serious adverse effects. Many health care professionals, however, often lack sufficient background in alcohol screening and brief intervention strategies to effectively help patients who use alcohol above recommended limits. In particular, they often lack the necessary interpersonal process skills critical to addressing issues of patient resistance and ambivalence about reducing their alcohol use. Purpose: The primary goal of this STRR Phase I grant is to develop and evaluate a prototype interactive personal computer-based training simulation, designed to teach healthcare providers to conduct alcohol screening and brief intervention. SIMmersion LLC has developed this proposal in partnership with faculty and scientists at the University of Wisconsin Medical School (UW). SIMmersion's simulation development capacity is based on proprietary technology that has been used to produce human simulations for several Government agencies. Methodology: During Phase I an expert panel consisting of UW students and health care professionals will work in collaboration with SIMmersion to develop the content and verbal scripts for the clinical scenarios. They will also conduct an interim assessment designed to maximize the accuracy and real life applicability of the prototype before starting with the Phase II grant. The Phase II grant will be used to add video to the simulation, help screens and other training aids to the product. It will also be used to conduct a randomized educational trial to demonstrate the efficacy of the computer based training simulation in improving the skills of health care providers. Significance: The simulated patient program, using the SIMmersion technology, is expected to significantly advance our ability to train medical professionals in human processing and interaction skills. Commercialization of the proposed training program will focus on marketing the product to health care professional schools in the US and Western Europe, specialty society continuing education programs and health care systems. The product will have important economic advantages over other methods of training medical personal about alcohol screening and brief intervention.