Jeff Cooper, CMS Executive Director, was chosen to deliver the 2011 Lewis H. Wright Memorial Lecture at this year’s American Society of Anesthesiologist’s Annual Meeting.  In his lecture, titled  “APSF and Anesthesia Patient Safety: Leadership Lessons From the Legacy of Jeep Pierce”, Dr. Cooper described the beginnings of the patient safety movement and the founding of the Anesthesia Patient Safety Foundation (APSF). He spoke about the vison and leadership of its founders, who included Dr. Ellison “Jeep” Pierce, and commented on how anesthesiology was at the forefront of this sea of change nearly 20 years ahead of the rest of medicine. Dr. Cooper concluded by noting that focused research and clinical improvements over the past 26 years have made anesthesiology very safe. And, that although the anesthesia community should feel very good about these improvements in patient safety, there is still much work to be done.

A look back at the development  of CMS’ Healthcare Adventures^TM (HCA) team-training workshops for healthcare leadership and management teams was featured in a recent  Donaghue Foundation Newsletter.  It was a grant from the Donaghue Foundation in 2007 that led to the development of  the current version of the HCA program. Recently, Donaghue provided a generous supplemental grant to help CMS investigate the prospects of diseminating HCA on a broader regional, and potentially national, basis.

Designed for both clinical and non-clinical healthcare leadership and management teams, HCA is a one-day group workshop that combines customized team challenges with a simulated patient in a highly realistic clinical environment. Yes, non-clinicians actually get the chance to care for a patient and experience real-life issues first hand. It’s an eye-opener! In this highly realistic clinical setting, teams can identify group strengths and capitalize on them; or, identify barriers to effective teamwork and tackle them head on. Applying the learnings collected from training the most dynamic and high-stakes teams of Harvard physicians over the last twelve years, the HCA workshop offers an unrivalled performance-enhancing experiences for any leadership, management or administrative group involved in healthcare.

The Patrick & Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation was established by Ethel Donaghue in memory of her parents. The Foundation is a charitable testamentary trust dedicated to furthering the search for medical knowledge of practical benefit to human life and to the quality of the lives of people, particularly in Connecticut. The Foundation focuses on initiatives in and for the State to strengthen research on health issues, to promote future research leadership, and to put new knowledge to work for public benefit.

Professor Gudela Grote, PhD, from ETH Zurich will be talking about her group’s work on coordination and leadership in high-risk teams at an informal luncheon meeting at CMS on Wednesday, December 14 starting at noon. 

Gudela Grote, PhD, is a full Professor of Work and Organizational Psychology at the Department of Management, Technology, and Economics at ETH Zurich, The main objective of her research is to provide psychologically based concepts and methods for integrative job and organizational design, taking into consideration the changing technological. economic and societal demands and opportunities. Of special interest to Dr. Grote are the increasing flexibility and virtuality of work and their consequences for the individual and organizational management of uncertainty. Application fields for Prof. Grote’s research are teamwork and standardization in high-risk systems, management of the psychological contract, career development, effects of new technologies on work processes, and collaborative planning within an between organizations.

Prof. Grote is associate editor of the journal Safety Science and member of the editorial board of several other journals. She has published widely on topics in Organizational Behavior, Human Factors, Human Resource Management, and safety management. She has worked with companies such as the Swiss Railways, Swiss Re and various public organizations. Together with Prof. Bruno Staffelbach from the University of Zurich she publishes annually the “Schweizer HR-Barometer”.

Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meeting
CIMIT Boston Simulation Consortium Quarterly Meeting
December 13th, Tuesday from 5:00-7:00 pm
Center for Medical Simulation
65 Landsdowne Street, Cambridge, MA, 1st Floor

This meeting will focus on topics of interest to the greater Boston simulation community such as the upcoming Society for Simulation in Healthcare Annual meeting (IMSH), the development of a collective simulation website calendar for Boston area simulation centers and potential grant opportunities.

The Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meetings provide a friendly and informal venue for simulation educators and researchers to present work-in-progress, discuss relevant ideas from other disciplines and connect with others with an interest in simulation. The meetings are held on the 2nd Tuesday of each month. Please join us!

Up-coming meetings:

January 10th:
Preparation and preview for International Meeting on Simulation in Healthcare, 2012. If you would like to present a work in progress for feedback from the group or give a preview of your completed presentation we welcome your work. Contact  Jenny Rudolph at jwrudolph@partners.org.

February 21:
Emily Hayden, MD, MEd, Gilbert Program in Medical Simulation, Harvard Medical School, Department of Emergency Medicine and Massachusetts General Hospital Learning Lab
Measuring Problem Representation Among Preclinical Medical Students Following Mannequin Simulations.
Clinical reasoning is an important skill for medical students to acquire during both their pre-clinical and clinical years. Based on the work on teaching problem representation as a framework for clinical reasoning, the purpose of this project was to develop an instrument capable of detecting differences between students who were trained to use problem representation versus those who were not.

Jeff Cooper, CMS’ Executive Director, was recently honored as a MGH HAVEN ( Helping Abuse and Violence End Now) Domestic Violence Unsung Hero.  Jeff has been an active member of MGH Men Against Abuse for many years. As noted by HAVEN, “His continuing dedication and willingness to get involved in the early days of the men’s effort to raise awareness and end domestic violence is greatly appreciated.” Congratualations to Jeff on receiving this award and for being involved in such a worthwhile group.

The HAVEN Program at MGH was officially launched in January of 1997. Its mission is to work as part of the broader movement to end intimate partner abuse by improving and enhancing our health care response to patients, employees, and community members who have been impacted by abuse. Click here to view Director Elizabeth  Speakman discussing HAVEN at MGH.

Please join us on Tuesday November 8th, Tuesday from 5:30-7:00 PM for the Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meeting.

Topic:  Simulation Instructor Certification as a Peer-Guided Learning Process

Toni Walzer, MD, Deb Navedo, PhD, CPNP, CNE, Jenny W. Rudolph, PhD, Robert Simon EdD,

Over the past 10 years, the Center for Medical Simulation’s approach to developing and certifying its own instructors has evolved.  This interactive session will discuss the recently revised CMS certification process, which includes peer observation, rating, and feedback on debriefings.  The meeting will provide attendees with the opportunity to observe, rate, and provide feedback on a debriefing, and to discuss the action research project being led by Deb Navedo to understand what faculty learn via this process.

More detail: Both the process of agreeing on instructor certification criteria, and the process of putting them into practice foster debate about what it means to be a competent simulation instructor. With the help of Deb Navedo from the Institute for Health Professions at MGH, CMS has also embarked on an action research project to study how our “Community of Practice” learns from each other about how to improve debriefing skills. 　

Toni Walzer, MD co-directs the Labor and Delivery Teamwork Simulation Program at CMS
Deb Navedo, PhD, CPNP, CNE is the Coordinator of Teaching and Learning Certificate Program, MGH Institute of Health Professions
Jenny W. Rudolph, PhD directs the Graduate Program of the Institute for Medical Simulation
Robert Simon, EdD is the Education Director of the Center for Medical Simulation and directs the Institute for Medical Simulation.

About the Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meeting:
Our meetings provide a friendly and informal venue for simulation educators and researchers to present work-in-progress, acquaint each other with relevant ideas from other disciplines and connect with others. We meet the 2nd Tuesday of each month. Please join us! 　    

Up-coming meetings:    

December 13th:     

Measuring Problem Representation Among Preclinical Medical Students Following Mannequin Simulations    

Emily Hayden, MD, MEd, Gilbert Program in Medical Simulation, Harvard Medical School, Department of Emergency Medicine and Massachusetts General Hospital Learning Lab    

Clinical reasoning is an important skill for medical students to acquire during both their pre-clinical and clinical years.  Based on the work on teaching problem representation as a framework for clinical reasoning, the purpose of this project was to develop an instrument capable of detecting differences between students who were trained to use problem representation versus those who were not.     

January  10th: Preparation and preview for International Meeting on Simulation in Healthcare, 2012    

We’ve added two IMS “Simulation as a Teaching Tool” Simulation Instructor Workshops in 2012.  The first workshop will be held at the Medical Simulation Center at Loma Linda University  in Loma Linda, California from February 6-9, 2012.  A few months later the CMS Faculty will head to New York City where they’ll teach the course at the Institute for Medical Simulation and Learning (IMSAL) at the Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx.

Taught by CMS’ Harvard faculty, the Simulation as a Teaching Tool Workshop is a 4-day intensive immersion in healthcare simulation that is specifically designed for those educators seeking to develop high quality simulation programs. It covers high level elements and concepts involved in using simulation as a teaching tool.

Drawing on the disciplines of aviation, healthcare, psychology, experiential learning, and organizational behavior, participants learn how to teach clinical, behavioral, and cognitive skills through simulation. Participants explore simulator based teaching methods applicable across the healthcare education spectrum, including undergraduate and graduate medical, nursing and allied health domains.

The daily formats vary and include simulation scenarios, lectures, small and large group discussions, and practical exercises with feedback. Ample opportunities are provided for networking and sharing experiences. Attendees join a growing community of Institute graduates who are positioned as leaders in the field.

Tuition for this workshop is $4,000

To learn more about the workshop, or to apply, visit the Center for Medical Simulation (CMS) website’s IMS webpage at
http://www.harvardmedsim.org/ims/html. You can also email CMS at info@harvardmedsim.org , or call Gary Rossi, CMS’ COO at 617.768.8267

IMS LOMA LINDA FLYER 
IMS IMSAL NY FLYER

Join your Simulation colleagues on Tuesday October 11, from 5:30-7pm for the monthly Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meeting.  The meeting is being hosted by Center for Medical Simulation,  65 Landsdowne Street, Cambridge, MA 02139

 A  Conversation with John Morey PhD, senior research psychologist at Dynamics Research Corporation, Andover, MA.  The Sim Center Goes to War:  Using Civilian Simulation Centers for Army National Guard and Reserve Medical Unit Training

Dr. John Morey is the senior research psychologist at Dynamics Research Corporation, Andover, MA,  and has 33 years of experience as a practicing human factors specialist and applied psychologist. For the past twenty years Dr. Morey has been conducting research into methods to improve performance in high skill, mission-critical military and healthcare work settings. He was a member of the original development team for the MedTeams® project, a joint civilian and military program to transition lessons-learned from aviation crew resource management to health care. Most recently he has been conducting research to improve simulation training opportunities for Army National Guard and Reserve medical care providers. His earlier research involved improving individual and team performance through the use of aviation and combat vehicle full-mission simulators. Dr. Morey has led projects to improve skilled performance training programs, the design and evaluation of job performance aids, the analysis of workload, measuring the relationship between attitudes and performance, and operational improvements in visual and mechanical systems used by high-performance teams. Dr. Morey holds a PhD from the University of Georgia in experimental psychology, and has over 80 publications, presentations, and technical reports in  human factors and training development.
 
About the Boston Simulation Community Research and Education Meeting:

BSCREM meetings provide a friendly and informal venue for simulation educators and researchers to present work-in-progress, acquaint each other with relevant ideas from other disciplines and connect with others. We meet the 2nd Tuesday of each month.

Everyone here at the Center for Medical Simulation extends their heartfelt congratulations to Catherine “Kate” Morse, MSN, RN, CCRN, CRNP-BC on being chosen as the receipient of a Jonas Scholarship to help support her studies toward a  PhD in Nursing.  Kate, who is an Alumna of CMS’ IMS Comrehensive and Gradute courses is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Division of  Graduate Nursing at Drexel University.  Kate is one of only 58 people from across the country to receive this prestigious scholarship.

The Jonas Center for Nursing Excellence was established in 2006 by the Barbara and Donald Jonas Family Fund to advance the profession of nursing  in novel and traditional ways. Through its philanthropy, the Center has awarded nearly $3 million towards the Jonas Nurse Leaders Scholar Program to support the education of new nursing faculty, to stimulate joint faculty appointments between schools of nursing and clinical affiliates and to bring together opinion leaders to develop solutions to long-standing problems challenging the nursing profession