Developing emotional preparedness and mental resilience through high-fidelity simulation: A ‘Bridge Too Far’ for institutions teaching major trauma management and mass-casualty medicine?

Clinical acumen represents only part of being adequately equipped to attend a major incident. The emotive sights, sounds and smells inherent of these dynamic environments are all-encompassing experiences and thus responders must also be armed with the emotional preparedness to perform their clinical or managerial duties effectively; as well as the mental resilience to facilitate professional continuance. Despite this, limited training and a sparsity of evidence exists to guide developments within this domain. Background: Historically, major incident training has focused on clinical principles; but irrespective of how comprehensive this teaching might be, or how fortuitously the learning materials meet national guidelines, they are of little consequence if tandem steps to cultivate mental resilience and emotional preparedness are absent. Effectively dovetailing these three elements is essential if teaching institutions are to properly prepare students for real-world practice. High-Fidelity Simulation (HFS) has a growing reputation as an effective means of bridging important gaps between theory and practice; and to help identify if this modality could cultivate these advancements, we exposed studentsto a large-scale HFS and conducted an evaluation-based study to better understand their lived experience. The primary aim was to ascertain the impact on clinical acumen, emotional preparedness and mental resilience; to help develop teaching and learning practices Methods: Quantitative data was obtained from a sample of 108 students undertaking paramedic science, physician associate studies and adult nursing. Self-completed questionnaires incorporating a 7-point Likert scale were utilised; and each student’s strength of agreement was rated against a series of statements surrounding acquisition of clinical acumen, emotional preparedness and mental resilience. Ethical approval was granted and SPSS v28 employed to analyse the data. Results: 91% of students agreed the combination of theoretical training and HFS provided made them feel clinically prepared to attend a real major incident; 86% agreed this experience had developed their mental resilience and 90% agreed that they felt emotionally prepared to attend a major incident. Conclusion: HFS is a practicable teaching and learning tool; and effective in developing clinical acumen, mental resilience and emotional preparedness in learners training to work in disaster environments or emergency medicine settings.