Adapting Immersive Gameplay and Design Thinking for Learning Family Caregivers’ Emotional Journey through End-of-Life Care and for Training Medical Students’ Grief Literacy

Principal Investigator: Mr Ki Sum Samson Wong, Medical Ethics and Humanities Unit, School of Clinical Medicine
(E: sum41@hku.hk)

What will be addressed?

As of August 8, 2021, there have been more than 4,200,000 deaths worldwide due to COVID-19. When there is loss, there is grief. And with physical distancing, strict isolation rules, visitor restrictions in healthcare facilities, and the inability to implement usual funerals and burials, COVID has fundamentally altered our human experience of bereavement and the grieving process. In 2020, a study reported that experiencing bereavement during COVID-19 elicited more severe acute grief reactions than before the pandemic. Globally, scholars have projected complicated grief and prolonged grief disorder to be the prominent psychiatric sequelae of the COVID-19 pandemic. In February 2022, an international panel of death studies scholar jointly issued a call for grief literacy movement for communities and helping professionals to identify grief more readily and to be proactive in adopting appropriate support in avoiding complications from the grieving process. Against the backdrop of medical humanities education at HKU, how can we gear medical students up to support families going through end-of-life caregiving or experiencing personal loss?

What will be done?

We propose to develop a novel “online” experiential learning module in the MBBS curriculum which comprises a 2-hr immersive video gaming experience, followed by a unique debriefing session. In this project, we seek to harness the untapped potential of an award-winning serious game consistently recommended in top medical journals including JAMA and The Lancet Oncology. This project will be an experiment, pushing the boundaries a bit to see (i) what about burden of care, grief and bereavement could learners experience emotionally from a video game, (ii) how this may help HKU MBBS students connect with families of terminally ill patients in their future practice.

Augmented Reality Smart Glasses Technology for Immersive Learning in the Emergency Department (AGILE-1)

Principal Investigator: Dr Pui Kin Lam, Department of Emergency Medicine, School of Clinical Medicine
(E: lampkrex@hku.hk)

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted traditional clinical teaching, depriving medical students of valuable clinical engagement with patients in the emergency department (ED). The current model of delivering teaching via livestreaming of resuscitation cases using an iPad requires two doctors for each small group session, and is not sustainable given the increasing class size.

The Microsoft HoloLens 2 is an augmented reality (AR) head-mounted device (HMD) which enables a single clinical teacher to facilitate real-time distant immersive learning by medical students on acutely-ill ED patients while insulating them from infection risks.

In this project, we aim to 1) develop an AR HMD prototype based on HoloLens for clinical teaching; and to 2) to evaluate the knowledge gain, student mental load, satisfaction, motivation and tolerability.

We propose a 1-year project with 2 phases. In phase 1, we will pilot test the AR system in clinical teaching in the ED of Queen Mary Hospital. In phase 2, we will conduct a randomised controlled trial to compare the impact of AR learning and livestreaming on student knowledge, satisfaction, motivation and adverse effects. This study will provide useful data to inform future application of AR technologies in other high-risk learning environments with restricted student access.

Developing Telemedicine Consultation Skills for Future Doctors

Principal Investigator: Dr Anderson Chun On Tsang, Department of Surgery
(E: acotsang@hku.hk)

Telemedicine has an increasingly important role in the delivery of healthcare. Aside from providing consultation to remotely located patients, it is also utilized for time-sensitive emergency such as tele-stroke assessment, and in situation where physical contact is restricted as highlighted by the social distancing measures in the COVID-19 pandemic. The practice of effective telemedicine requires unique skills, which are not taught in the medical curriculum at present. This project will develop the curriculum and teaching materials for effective telemedicine consultation, including professional web-side manners and adapted physical examination skills. We aim to teach our future doctors how to carry out an effective telemedicine consultation in different specialties and in different clinical settings.

Effectiveness of an Adaptive Learning System in Smart Environment for Nursing Students in Tracheostomy Emergency Care Management during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Principal Investigator: Dr Cecilia Hoi Mei Kong, School of Nursing
(E: kong@hku.hk)

This project aims to examine whether the application of an Adaptive Learning System (ALS) in smart environment teaching tool can enhance undergraduate nursing students’ knowledge of infection control and prevention when a patient has suspected or confirmed COVID-19. This innovative pedagogy in digital learning tools translates adaptive learning theory into practice through professional education and research. The student learning journey map will be used to understand student engagement and the student learning experience. This tool can enhance students’ self-efficacy to accomplish learning goals and objectives. The Adaptive Learning System (ALS) pedagogical approach allows for the collection and analysis of undergraduate students’ learning processes, how student moves through a sequence of problems with the amount of scaffolding, and students learning needs or changes in a student’s response time across problems. The ALS can help students develop new ways of thinking in learning. Students can apply prior knowledge to new situations, transfer knowledge, reach decisions and make evaluations by using adaptive content, assessment, and sequences.

The specific objectives are:

1. To examine the effectiveness of learner-controlled ALS learning with a student learning journey map in the learning process, learning engagement and learning outcomes
2. To measure how ALS teaching and learning experiences help nursing students learn complex cognitive skills
3. To enhance students’ knowledge and confidence in tracheostomy assessment, care and management in a critical care patient with suspected or confirmed COVID 19
4. To examine students’ self-efficiency in ALS learning

Engaging BPharm Students as Partners in Teaching and Learning: Establishment of Online Learning Activity in Dietary Supplements

Principal Investigator: Mr Tsun Lee, Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacy
(E: marcolt@hku.hk)

Dietary supplements are commonly accepted by the general public in Hong Kong and have an emerging role in medical care. However, to date, complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) have not been extensively included in current teaching curriculum yet. In view of this, there is a need to promote teaching and learning of CAM to enhance student’s learning in this area.

This project aims to incorporate the concepts of “Student as Partners” into teaching. In the project, BPharm students will take the initiative to construct a web-based E-learning platform with learning materials in form of short animations about selected dietary supplements. We aim to differentiate the E-learning activity into two levels: topics in basic level will be opened to all students in HKU, while some topics with more advanced level will also be opened for all HKU students with a science and medical background. Participants can initiate self-directed learning during their comfortable time in an enjoyable and relaxed manner.

With Outcomes-Based Approaches to Student Learning (OBASL), post-activity quizzes will be available to consolidate students’ learning outcomes. There will be interactive assessments after some learning modules to facilitate students to apply knowledge that they acquire through the E-learning activity. In order to continuously motivate and empower students, scoring system will be implemented and a certificate will be presented to students who complete and pass all the learning modules at the end of the project. The effectiveness of the project will be evaluated by assessing student’s learning outcomes and their feedback to the learning platform.

Engaging Near-peer Tutors in Problem-based Learning: Impact on Teaching, Learning, and Career Development

Principal Investigator: Dr Binbin Zheng, Bau Institute of Medical and Health Sciences Education
(E: binbinz@hku.hk)

Near-peer teaching (NPT) has been increasingly adopted in health professions education, either to alleviate teaching pressure for faculty, prepare students for future role as medical educators, or to empower students as agents of their own curriculum. NPT has been suggested to be both beneficial for NPT tutors and tutees because of the social and cognitive congruence between them.

This project will focus on engaging NPT tutors in problem-based learning (PBL) in the MBBS curriculum at HKU. It involves four phases. First, we will provide information session and recruit Year 3-5 students who might be interested in becoming near-peer tutors in PBL curriculum. Second, a carefully-designed teacher training program focusing on teaching strategies and facilitating skills will be provided for near-peer tutors. Third, near-peer tutors will facilitate half of the PBL sessions, where 300 first-year MBBS students are divided into groups of 10 students discussing around a particular clinical case throughout three 2-hour tutorials. Fourth, surveys, interviews, and video recordings of both near-peer tutor- and faculty tutor-led PBL tutorials will be analyzed to examine the effectiveness and impact of NPT on both tutors’ and tutees’ learning.

In summary, this project will develop a teaching certificate program specifically designed for NPTs who will be involved in problem-based learning or other formats of small group discussion in various disciplines. We will also develop an observation protocol which could be used for future professional development for both near-peer tutors and faculty tutors in PBL, as well as for future research in PBL. In addition, by comprehensively examining the impact of NPT on tutors’ and tutees’ learning, this study could provide implications for how to best implement NPT in formal health professions educational curriculum, and shed light on other projects involving NPTs in small group discussion settings across various disciplines.

Enhancement of Musculoskeletal Clinical Skills Through Formative Assessment in an e-Classroom

Principal Investigator: Dr Tak Man Wong, Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology
(E: wongtm@hku.hk)

This project will use an e-platform to support formative assessments for continuous learning and teaching in Orthopaedics and Traumatology (O&T) in the medical curriculum. This project will produce eight clinical examination videos with the collaboration of patients and O&T experts focusing on the body parts of the hip, knee, shoulder and spine. Interactive and formative assessments will be integrated into the videos. At least 5 multiple-choice questions will be popped up while playing the video. Answers and explanations will be provided immediately after students answer each question. Students can do this self-learning assessment at their own pace and time, and they can self-monitor if they have achieved the learning outcome of the 8 videos. The formative assessments will be made available on an e-Learning portal for students to access anywhere and anytime. This integrated e-learning platform will not only enhance knowledge retention, facilitate staff-students feedback, but also facilitate students’ ability to translate theory to clinical practice in their learning. The success of the project will be measured qualitatively and quantitatively in the form of feedback from students, consumption patterns of e-learning resources, and pre-and post- learning assessment performance. This will be a pioneer interactive and formative video assessment for clinical year students (Year 4 and 5) in O&T, the successful implementation of this project will apply to other specialities such as surgery and medicine.

Enhancing Care Prioritization Competency in Nursing Students through an Innovative Peer-to-peer Multi-patient Simulation – A Cross-University Collaboration

Principal Investigator: Dr John Tai Chun Fung, School of Nursing
(E: bigjohn@hku.hk)

The COVID-19 pandemic produced challenges throughout undergraduate nursing students, as they were prevented from undertaking their clinical practicum. One key domain in clinical nursing education is effective care prioritization for multiple patients. However, the fast-paced and unpredictable nature of clinical environments, such as during a pandemic, can impose high risks for students, instructors, and patients, resulting in barriers to prioritization skill acquisition. Prioritization competency is essential for safety and quality. Not only does the pandemic cause barriers to skills acquisition, at the same time it could be difficult to teach and for students to master in traditional clinical settings. One way to meet this challenge is using peer-to-peer multi-patient simulation (MPS), where a deliberate focus is placed on prioritization skills in controlled, low-risk environments. From the literature, the anticipated challenges will promote student teamwork, communication, and collaboration skills.

To date, we have not examined the impact of a multi-patient simulation that students could build on to achieve their program learning outcomes with the engagement of other Nursing schools in the 7 major Universities funded by UGC. This simulation pedagogy will follow scenarios that align with NLN/Jefferies simulation framework, which provides the best evidence such as clear objectives, appropriate fidelity for learning objectives, and a structured debriefing following a scenario. The backbone of the pedagogy is by implementing an innovative concept, “peer-to-peer multi-patient simulation”.

Enhancing Clinical and Cultural Virtual Encounter in Health Professional Students: 3Is (Internationalization, Innovation, Interdisciplinary) in Action

Principal Investigator: Dr Polly Siu Ling Chan, School of Nursing
(E: pollycha@hku.hk)

The realization of the HKU’s vision (2016-2025) is based on 3+1 Is: Internationalization, Interdisciplinarity and Innovation, which converge to create collective Impact. This is an important direction for HKU teaching scholars to develop the strategic themes for enhancing the teaching and learning of students. Despite the devastating effect of the COVID-19 pandemic in different aspects of people’s lives, it creates an increased opportunity to virtually connect local and international students of higher education with unique characteristics in terms of e-learning without travelling abroad.

To enhance students’ effective learning in an online environment, the Community of Inquiry (CoI) has been cited frequently as one of the exclusive models that focuses on social presence, cognitive presence and teaching presence. Social presence focuses on developing students’ sense of connectedness and belonging that would promote collaborative learning. Cognitive presence aims at enhancing students to participate more actively in online learning, leading to higher-order thinking and knowledge building. Teaching presence highlights developing students’ social and cognitive processes through a quality online instructional experience.

In this project, 3Is will be incorporated into the CoI Model. One hundred and twenty health professional students of different health disciplines (Interdisciplinarity) from Hong Kong, mainland China and overseas (Internationalization) will be invited to go through three innovative intercultural and clinical case-based learning modules (Innovation).

In the learning modules, case-based learning (CBL) covering three clinical scenarios with cultural dimensions and sharing commonalities of professional skills as a deliberate instructional design will be adopted to enhance the online learning engagement of interprofessional students via a teamwork approach. The strategies for enhancing student learning will be devised based on social presence, cognitive presence and teaching presence, with a focus on clinical and intercultural learning, and student-as-partner initiatives.

To measure the project outcomes, both quantitative and qualitative data will be collected from students and the involved teachers. They include i) interprofessional education (IPE) learning experience of students by Students Perceptions of Interprofessional Clinical Education Revised (SPICE-R); ii) cultural awareness learning of students by Modified Cultural Awareness Scale (mCAS); iii) student empowerment in active learning by Learner Empowerment Scale (LES); iv) online learning engagement of students by Online Student Engagement questionnaire (OSE); v) students’ and teachers’ experiences in terms of IPE and intercultural learning through thematic analysis.

It is envisaged that CoI incorporated 3Is can create a synergistic effect by supporting student learning.

Evaluate the Learning Satisfaction and Performance of Focused Client Interview and the User Experiences on Using Semi-humanoid Robot as Simulated Patient, Supplemented with Smartphone-based Voicebots in Nursing Undergraduates

Principal Investigator: Ms Cecilia Tin Yan Sit, School of Nursing
(E: ceciliasit@hku.hk)

Communication skills is essential for nursing students when they collect subjective data during focused client interview, effective skills in communication can facilitate clinical reasoning in terms of noticing, interpreting, and responding to client’s complaints. In a previous study, we explored the effectiveness of using a conversation-oriented chatbot via a semi-humanoid robot in learning a focused client interview, it was found that the semi-humanoid robot, who acted as a simulated patient, could supplement the existing modalities of learning, and enhance students’ self-efficacy when face-to-face clinical learning is not possible, this alternative platform also promoted students’ clinical reasoning process. However, some promising drawbacks were identified when a robot is used solely, like the venue restriction to campus, technical problems etc.

Building on earlier work of using chatbots, this project explores the effectiveness and experience of an additional smartphone-based voicebot using students’ own smartphones after practicing with the simulated patient in school. The smartphone-based voicebot is more convenient, which enables students to practice communication regardless of time and geographical constraints. Students can have self-practice after the teacher’s in-class comment without any pressure at their own time and place. This study aims to study the learning satisfaction and performance as well as the user experience of focused client interview by using both simulated patient and smartphone-based a voicebot.

The Impact of a Student-driven Near-peer Teaching Initiative for Medical Students: an Exploratory Study

Principal Investigator: Dr Julie Yun Chen, Department of Family Medicine and Primary Care
(E: juliechen@hku.hk)

Student-led academic support in which senior students offer tutorials, bedside teaching or examination preparation to their junior peers is a longstanding practice in medical education that has been offered on an ad-hoc basis. Building on earlier work that engaged students as teachers in formal curricular activities, this project explores the impact and experience of a wholly student-led near-peer teaching (NPT) initiative. MBBS Year 5 peer teachers (PT) will systematically develop and deliver tutorial sessions and undergo training in fundamental teaching skills to provide academic support for peer learners (PL) in Year 2. The NPT will add value and extend concepts learned, with deliberate care taken not to replace or to undermine the formal curriculum. A mixed-method quantitative-qualitative study will examine the impact of the initiative on both peer learners (PL) and peer teachers (PT). Structured questionnaire surveys will assess PL and PT self- efficacy and attitudes towards near-peer teaching. In-depth semi-structured focus group interviews will capture the lived experiences of the PLs as participants and the PTs as teachers of medicine and as learners of teaching practices. This will enable us to better understand the potential scope for student engagement in teaching and learning as we examine the possibilities for students-as-partners in medical education.

Integrate Concepts of Biomedical Sciences through Digital Storytelling – From Basic Science to Clinical Relevance

Principal Investigator: Dr Joanna Wen Ying Ho, School of Biomedical Sciences
(E: joannaho@hku.hk)

In recent years, technology enhanced learning has become an inseparable part of E-learning and face-to-face teaching. Digital storytelling, which uses multi-media tools to narrate a story, is present as a very attractive strategy, to be added into our teaching toolkit.

Informed by our earlier survey results (N=794) from junior MBBS and B. Nursing students, we know that they have strong preferences to learn through real life and clinical scenarios. We have since gathered various resources, from existing worldwide depositories to appropriate local scenarios for direct incorporation into the contextualized concept of teaching. However, most of such scenarios are in paper format, and most of the scenarios are used on disjointed, random occasions on apparently stand-alone individual lecture topics. In accordance with the latest adaptive changes towards online learning, our major objective for this project is to add into our common teaching toolkit, some integrated teaching materials in digitalized storytelling formats. First, we would like to integrate the paper-forms of the stand-alone scenarios into more complete and coherent tailor-made stories for our medical curriculum. Second, we would like to revitalize them into digital storytelling formats. We believe that, through digitalized storytelling, the fusion of the closer to life clinical scenarios with the more abstract basic science concepts should help our students to connect better with the basic science concepts, as well as to help them to make better connections with interdisciplinary topics in basic sciences. For practicing teachers, with the purpose of ultimately using the different parts of the same scenarios, we actively take part in building a holistic medical curriculum through jointly creating the stories. We would also like to involve participation from a team of students along the production pipeline for constructive ideas, and for evaluation of the final products of this project.

An Integrative Module for First-year Pharmacy Students: Increasing Clinical Exposure and Enhancing Professional Identity

Principal Investigator: Ms. Jody Kwok Pui Chu, Department of Pharmacology and Pharmacy
(E: chukpj@hku.hk)

The HKU Bachelor of Pharmacy Program has implemented a curricular revamp from the academic year of 2020/2021 to adopt an integrated curriculum. By incorporating foundational and clinical sciences in an integrated curriculum, proposed benefits include promotion of students’ motivation and professional identity development 1-3. To bring out the essence of an integrated curriculum, clinical exposure and theory-practice integration should be encouraged from year one, where usually only foundational sciences were being taught.

This project focuses on developing and implementing an integrative module for year one pharmacy students as part of their orientation program. Through small group discussion facilitated by pharmacist tutor and senior students, sharing from pharmacists from different sectors, introductory workshop on clinical cases and pharmacy practice, the module aims to raise students’ appreciation of the diverse role of pharmacists and increase their professional identity as future pharmacists. Students will be guided to participate in reflective essays and group presentations to encourage professional development and peer learning.

Students’ motivation to study and professional identity will be evaluated using validated scales 4-6. Comparison of results will be made in the year one cohort before and after their participation in the module. The same result comparison will also be performed between year one and year two students to evaluate the impact of the module.

Online Peer Mentorship Programme under Covid-19 to Enhance Emotional Intelligence (EI) for Undergraduate Nursing Students Preparing Clinical Practicum

Principal Investigator: Dr Joanna Hiu Ki Ko, School of Nursing
(E: kojoanna@hku.hk)

Background

Emotional intelligence (EI) is crucial to nursing practice with a high occupational stress level. EI would help tackle high levels of anxiety, low self-esteem, depression, sleep disturbances and burnout among nurses². EI also equips nursing students against challenges during clinical practicum. Particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic, nursing students may have stress levels increased during clinical practicum due to close contact with suspected and confirmed cases 3. In spite of the online teaching mode of university making convenient access to resources for students, such as clinical skill videos and virtual simulation mimicking different clinical circumstances, students still require emotional competence for their clinical practice.

In this project, we plan to develop an online peer mentorship programme and evaluate its effect on enhancing students’ EI level to prepare them for clinical practicum. EI relies on interpersonal intelligence and interacting with social environment 4. We experienced an optimistic effect on EI brought by peer mentoring, as nursing students could learn through imitation and modelling 5. Therefore, we expect this project will be effective in enhancing participants’ EI level and optimizing their learning experience in clinical practicum.

Objectives

The project aims to (1) develop an online peer mentorship programme for clinical practicum preparation among nursing undergraduates under covid-19 by establishing learning communities between senior and junior nursing undergraduates and promoting student-focused interactions and (2) evaluate the effect of peer mentorship on EI among nursing undergraduates.

Expected Outcomes/deliverables

1. An online peer mentorship programme will be established for nursing undergraduates.
2. EI levels among nursing graduates will be increased after joining the peer mentorship programme.
3. An international peer review publication on reporting the findings.
4. A conference presentation to disseminate findings with other scholars in the field of nursing education.

Rethinking the Nursing Curriculum and Pedagogy to Reduce Students’ Psychosocial Impacts in the Remote Learning Transition under the COVID-19 Pandemic

Principal Investigator: Dr Angie Ho Yan Lam, School of Nursing
(E: angielam@hku.hk)

The COVID-19 pandemic has created devastating impacts on nursing students’ psychological wellbeing, social relationships and school life. Nursing students, and other health professional students, may be particularly vulnerable as they face additional learning challenges, including suspensions of hands-on practical sessions and clinical placements, replacing these experiences with virtual simulation programs, remote learnings and new practicum mode in the community. The sudden transition impedes clinical transition, psychological readiness in real-world practice, and academic social interaction. These psychosocial impacts may affect students’ learning efficacy and subsequently their academic achievement and future job engagement.

There is an urgent need to shape the curriculum and pedagogies to address students’ psychosocial needs under remote learning transition. This proposal aims to understand the psychosocial conditions of nursing students’ during the pandemic and psychosocial factors that affect students learning and academic performance in remote learning. Most importantly, the project assesses the students’ psychosocial needs amidst remote learning transition to inform the priority areas and resource allocation to shape the school’s policy, curriculum and pedagogical development.

Students as Co-Designers – Formalizing Student-Educator Partnerships in Curriculum and Pedagogy Co-Creation

Principal Investigator: Dr Mei Li Khong, School of Clinical Medicine
(E: khongml@hku.hk)

The University of Hong Kong strives to enable students to become full partners in teaching and learning (T&L). However, are educators prepared to relinquish control? Are students equipped to tackle this novel situation? Research increasingly highlights the transformative potential of student-educator partnerships. Students as key stakeholders in their own education could significantly impact both student and the institution. For example, involving students in curriculum development could empower students as agents of their own curriculum reform; increase their ownership of learning; gain a deeper understanding of learning; strengthen their professional identity formation; and build rapport among multiple stakeholders including students, teachers and institutions.

This project builds on previous work by the PI which successfully engaged students and educators as co-designers in MBBS E-learning. Using this tried and tested framework, we endeavor to introduce student-educator partnership on a larger scale across the T&L continuum in MBBS preclinical and Bachelor of Biomedical Sciences (BBiomedSci) curricula. Student co-investigators reflect the very partnership this project seeks to achieve.

This project has three phases. First, introductory workshops will create interest, awareness and understanding among MBBS and BBiomedSci students. Second, we will recruit student co-designers to initiate and refine learning developments alongside faculty educators. Students recruited at three different points in the academic year will be allocated to sub-teams according to areas of interest. Their initiatives will be shaped by the ADDIE instructional model and overseen by the PI and student co-investigators, who have extensive experience co-designing curriculum. Third, feedback from the T&L community will be gathered from a student-led showcase of student-educator partnership projects and a mixed-methods study of all stakeholders (student co-designers, student learners, educators, senior management) to assess the overall impact of the student-educator partnership.

In summary, this project will develop an innovative student as co-designers initiative in the biomedical curriculum while sharing best practices for empowering and engaging students in curriculum design, development, and implementation; and evaluating its impact on student learning, teaching, and career development. The results of this project could shed light on other student-educator partnership programs in HKU and beyond.

Student Engagement and Partnership (STEP) Program – A Pilot Project for the Paediatrics Curriculum

Principal Investigator: Dr Sophelia Hoi Shan Chan, Department of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, School of Clinical Medicine
(E: sophehs@hku.hk)

As students listen to lectures, through group learning activities and tutorials, they may recognize discrepancies in content, learning materials, repetition, and more. Traditional student feedback mechanisms such as end-of-course evaluations can give formative feedback to the faculty to improve the current curriculum. While student feedback is a good reference point, we would like to take one step forward by engaging the students as partners to help the faculty to co-design the changes in the Paediatric curriculum and educational videos. In fact, previous studies have shown that student partnership should be considered in curriculum development and such practice showed positive outcomes in curriculum changes [S. Brooman, S. Darwent & A. Pimor,2015] and also improved the attendance to lectures [Scott KW, et al, 2019].

Currently, the Paediatric MBBS Year 4 Junior Clerkship activities include whole-class lectures, small group learning, videos on clinical skills, and bedside teaching. With the STEP Program, students will be engaged and partnered with the teacher to act as student-teacher to co-create the educational videos for teaching. This pilot STEP program embraces the perspective of both the students and the teachers. Under the current pilot program, we evaluate the feasibility of this student-teacher collaboration in the development of a more student-centered Paediatric curriculum. The students also get the opportunity to perform something novel by partnering with the teacher in the co-creation of educational materials – the clinical videos, and even as a student-teacher to help with the on-video demonstration. At the end of the study, a survey will be carried out to evaluate the improvement of the clinical videos from the teachers and the students that are not involved in this pilot project. Two interviews will be performed, one for the participating students and one for the participating teachers, to evaluate the challenge and the factors that make the STEP Program feasible or difficult to implement, and the benefit and impact on the students and the teachers.

The cross-departmental teaching collaboration between the Department of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, and the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Care, in this STEP Program, will also allow curriculum sharing and the sharing of educational videos that will benefit the collaborative learning experience of both the students and the teachers. Moreover, the experience of this pilot project will also be shared with teachers within the Paediatrics department in educational meetings, and also with other clinical departments at local educational conferences to explain what ‘Student-Teacher Partnership’ is and how it can promote learning, and why it advances the medical education.

Using Game-based Virtual Reality with Instant Feedback to Enhance Nursing Students’ Situation Awareness

Principal Investigator: Dr Maggie Mee Kie Chan, School of Nursing
(E: chanmk1@hku.hk)

In light of the COVID-19 outbreak, nursing students’ clinical learning and experiences in hospital settings were interrupted, which affects their clinical reasoning and problem-solving skills. Students often feel stressed and guilty when they are not aware of the situation or capable of making accurate nursing interventions to help the patient. Many studies indicate that situation awareness is an essential component of ensuring patient safety. Situation awareness requires students to know what is happening by using their five senses and also be able to anticipate risks through early detection and perform appropriate actions. Situation awareness in healthcare can be trained but difficult because it involves training not only to enhance knowledge, but also distinct skills to perform in concert. Using game-based virtual reality simulation can allow students to learn and engage multiple learning in such as cognitive, behavior, emotional and experiential in synchrony. Instant feedback during the simulation can facilitate evaluation and reflect what they have learned. Meaningful feedback is an important contributing factor to improving students’ future performance.

Therefore, this project aims to enhance nursing students’ clinical reasoning and situation awareness through game-based virtual reality simulation with instant feedback.