Simulación clínica online para estudiantes de ciencias de la salud durante la pandemia de COVID-19

Introduction: In April 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced higher education institutions to close their doors. Health sciences students were left without the opportunity for internships and rotations due to the confinement, closure of universities and collapse of hospitals. Professors had to reconvert face-to-face activities into distance learning workshops delivered online. The study aims to identify and analyse the main online clinical simulation activities carried out in Chile during the COVID-19 pandemic between 2020 and 2021, the problems the centres faced, and the protocols they defined for their reopening.Materials and methodsA quantitative, observational, cross-sectional study was conducted among clinical simulation coordinators of higher education institutions in Chile, with an exploratory scope. For data collection, an ad-hoc instrument was designed and sent to all clinical simulation centres in Chile to find out about their online activities. The instrument has 2 areas: 1) the effects of the pandemic on faculty and students, 2) the type of activities carried out during the pandemic period.Results30 centres out of 64 responded to the instrument created, representing 47% of the country. 87% of the centres implemented remote activities during confinement. The most represented activities were high fidelity scenarios with 67%, followed by simulation with simulated and standardized patients with 57 and 33%, respectively. Concerning the reopening, 50% of the centre directors stated that occupancy was low and that they had to subdivide the groups according to the permitted capacity.DiscussionTeachers and students were well suited to each centre's protocols during the COVID-19 pandemic. The centres maintained high and low-fidelity virtual simulation activities during confinement, using software and applications maintained post-confinement. In the centre reopening, the low occupancy and subdivision of groups were the main difficulties due to the allowed capacity.