This past week I was honored to be in attendance at the 3rd Annual Society for Prehospital Educators in Canada's (SPEC) AGM and Conference in St. John's, Newfoundland.

Great Big Solutions continues to be a proud supporter of this Society and the annual event, in its continuing efforts to promote national collaboration amongst Prehospital educators.

I was privileged to meet many new faces, even those of which we have been working with over the years and hadn't had the opportunity to meet in person until now.

One of the most prevalent topics of the conference was Simulation training.  So many of the educators around the country are expanding their use of Simulation in their programs to enhance the skills of their students.  This topic at the event spanned everything from the use of Stress Innoculation and Cortisol testing, to Clinical Simulation Centers in hospitals, to the evaluation of student judgement in the Clinical Setting using high-fidelity simulation.

Simulation and its use in Prehospital programs has been debated recently, especially in discussions relating to the national competency profile for Paramedics in Canada.  There seems to be a push towards more Simulation experience as a tool for students to capture experience in high-risk, low-frequency skills.  With all of the evidence for simulation being proven as an environment that can enhance a learner's skill set in this area, it becomes (to me) a question of WHY it hasn't been as widely accepted as a proven tool in the field of Paramedicine training; when it comes to program budgets and investing in the technology, simulation time (%) allotted to Paramedic programs as compared to other Health Science fields, frequent high-fidelity experience to be recognized equally as less frequent experience on patients in the field.

We are interested in opening up this conversation to the Educators of all Health Science programs across the country, as in the end it affects all of us.  The more information and opinions we can share, the more changes we can make in the end.

Please comment if you have something to share about simulation training.  Are there research projects that you think would be advantageous to perform in order to address some of the concerns from the other side?

My thanks again to the members and executive of SPEC for including Great Big Solutions in their recent event.

Thanks, and happy tracking!

Kathryn

SPEC Conference St John's, June 30 - July 3, 2009

Great Big Solutions and CompTracker are once again proud sponsors of this year's event.  I had a great time mingling in Victoria last year, and hope to see you this year also!

Speakers include leading pre-hospital educators from across Canada from B.C. to Newfoundland and Labrador. Presentations include:

• Strategies to Maximize the Impact of Teaching and Learning
• Strategies to Maximize Your Teaching Performance
• Strangers, Gods, Monsters, and Learning Theory
• The use of High Fidelity Simulation in EMS Education
• What do we mean by "Clinical Judgment"?
• The Student as Teacher
• The Influence of Stress on Clinical Performance
• Panel Discussion - How do we maintain consistency between evaluators?
• Interactive session to explore the instructors' tool kit of learning activities
• Focus group discussions

Kathryn Fraser from Great Big Solutions will be in attendance from July 2-3, in case you have burning questions about CompTracker or want to grab a coffee!

Download the brochure for more information and how to attend:

n.b5z.net/i/u/10051305/f/temp/SPEC_2009.pdf