Design and Development of Virtual Patients for Healthcare Education: State of the Art and Research

Abstract

The digital transformation of healthcare and the COVID-19 pandemic have accelerated research and deployment of virtual patients (VP), that is, interactive computer simulations used in healthcare education to train students on clinical processes. To help researchers and practitioners understand the state of the art in VP development, we conducted a systematic literature review of 48 papers. Our analysis focused on educational level, medical specialty, competencies, technologies, technical format, and operating systems and tools. We found that VPs are primarily used in the medical field and student education as interactive patient scenarios based on multimedia system technology. VP authoring systems were identified as the primary tool for developing primary clinical reasoning skills. Based on our findings, we suggest implications for medical education research and practice