Cardiac Anaesthesia Simulation Training

Overview

Cardiac anaesthesia involves management of rapidly evolving high risk clinical situations in a complex environment. Patient management requires an understanding of the underlying cardiovascular changes, good teamwork and communication, and appropriate clinical interventions. Providing this training is a key priority according to the NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) guidelines 2007. Our experience in cardiac anaesthesia simulation training has shown that it increases students’ confidence in the assessment and management of these critically ill patients (Simulation of cardiopulmonary bypass management: An approach to Resident Training. Rex J Morais, B Ashokka, Chiang Siau, Lian Kah Ti, JCVA 2014, 28:5, 1387-1392).

Managing the Cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) state is a key part of cardiac anaesthesia. We have modified the existing high fidelity mannequin-based systems in order to simulate ongoing CPB and the complications that may arise. This cardiac anaesthesia simulation (CAST) training module has provided on-demand anaesthesia resident training in a more systematic and standardised manner, in a safe setting, within the limited timeframe. This LIFT project set out to enhance the procedural realism of the simulated experience in CAST to facilitate learning by:

1. Establishing the ability to seamlessly select and display context sensitive echocardiography (TEE) video clips and
2. Enabling display of relevant pre-recorded videos of ongoing surgical procedures in operating field (chest).