Realistic simulation as educational strategy on integral care to trauma victims

Objective: To report the experience of using realistic simulation as way of teaching and training medical students on the polytraumatized care. Methods: The simulation ambience consisted on a scenery with multiple victims in a collision of a car crash versus car versus obstacle. The students performed functions that are compatible with their knowledge (first aid, prehospital care or intrahospitalar care). The realistic scenery was assembled with clinical cases, makeup and appropriate material. For each victim there was a monitor who filled checklists containing the main points that should be addressed by the students.Afterwards a questionnaire was applied to evaluate the learning process. Result: Among the 55 students that participated, 32 answered the questionnaire. 97,75% of them are medical students and 6,25%, nursing students. Concerning the content of the simulation, 53,1% of the students reported they were exposed to new topics and 96,9% believe the simulation helped to fix the content learned during the course. Conclusion: The use of realistic simulation as a teaching methodology provides positive impact, once it is an early insertion on the clinic-surgical practices, diagnostic induction and development of trauma care.Keywords: Teaching; Training medical students; Traume; Victim; Medical students