Do simulated patient interviews change attitudes towards communication
skills training?
Abstract
Aim: This study aimed to evaluate the attitudes of medical faculty
sophomore students towards communication skills training module consists
theory courses and simulated patient interviews. Methods: This study was
planned in before-and-after intervention study and was carried out with
257 second-year medical students. The Communication Skills Attitude
Scale (CSAS) were used for data collection. The scale was administered
to the participants before the training (1), after the training (2), and
after the simulated patient interviews (3). Results: The mean age of the
students was 20.13±2.13 years, and 133 (51.8%) of them were female. PAS
1 and PAS 3 scores were 55.38±6.58 and 58.05±7.39, respectively, while
NAS 1 and 3 scores were 30.25±4.49 and 28.88±4.96, respectively. PAS 3
was considerably higher than PAS 1 and 2 scores (p=0.037), while NAS 3
was significantly lower than NAS 1 and 2 scores (p=0.005). There was no
difference between the positive and negative attitudes of females and
males before the training. However, after the training, female’s
positive scores significantly increased compared to men, and their
negative scores decreased. Positive attitude scores of the female
students increased after both the theory course and the simulated
patient interviews. On the other hand, the negative attitude scores
decreased significantly after the simulated patient interviews
(p<0.05). Conclusion: Communication skills training improves
students’ attitudes. In this improvement, the contribution of simulated
patient interviews is more than theory instructions.