A highly-configurable session designer for VR nursing training

Abstract

Virtual Reality (VR) has proven to be a valuable tool for medical and nursing education. VR simulators are available at any time and from anywhere, and can be used with or without faculty supervision, which results in a significant optimization of time, space, and resources. In this paper we present a highly-configurable session designer for VR-based nursing education following the Standards for QUality Improvement Reporting Excellence: SQUIRE 2.0 and SQUIRE-EDU. Unlike existing platforms, we focus on letting educators quickly customize the training sessions in multiple aspects. This is achieved through the use of a visual editor, where educators can choose the environment and the elements in the session, and a node-based visual system for programming the behavior of the sessions. Thanks to end-user customization, educators can develop different variants of a session, adapt the sessions to new nursing protocols, incorporate new equipment or instruments, or accommodate custom environments. We have implemented the designer and tested it on various nursing training scenarios. The designer can be integrated into VR simulators to help educators save time in delivering highly customizable training.

Keywords

• Nursing education
• Nursing training
• Virtual reality training
• Virtual reality medical simulator