Content area
Abstract
Assessment of clinical competence in medical training programs is essential for achieving assurance that students are competent to enter the next phase of their profession. The acquisition of appropriate clinical skills is significant in health education; nonetheless, students often complete their clinical education lacking vital performance skills. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of simulation training in comparison to the traditional method of training for improving radiology imaging students’ knowledge and technical skills performance. The researcher utilized a mixed-method design. The participants in this study were a group of first-year and second-year radiology imaging students. The students were assigned to an experimental group using (simulation) training and a control group (traditional) without simulation training. After implementing simulation training with the experimental groups, the finding showed a statistically significant difference between the simulation and traditional training groups (p < .05). The researcher controlled for the covariate of pretest scores, age, gender, ethnicity, and education level. The findings of the study indicated significant differences among the training groups’ posttest scores after controlling for the pretest scores and the covariates. The simulation training groups improved their knowledge content and demonstrated improvement in their technical skills performances compared to the traditional training groups on the radiographic procedures after the training. The findings in this study indicate the groups training with simulation show a significant improvement in their knowledge and technical skill performance. The scope of this study was to investigate the use of simulation methods of training in comparison to the traditional method of training to improve the acquisition of radiology imaging students’ knowledge and technical skill performance on radiographic procedures. The survey questionnaire indicated students’ reflection with the simulation training was positive and helped them to improve their knowledge content and competence in skills in performing radiographic procedures. Before the simulation training, students stated they felt less competent before the training and alleged the amount of time allotted for practicing radiographic procedures was inadequate. Meanwhile, the reflections from the students’ insight suggest prospects for implementing future research in simulation for the radiology profession.
