Virtual Patient Simulations in Health Professions Education: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis by the Digital Health Education Collaboration

Virtual patients are interactive digital simulations of clinical scenarios for the purpose of health professions education. There is no current collated evidence on the effectiveness of this form of education.

The goal of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of virtual patients compared with traditional education, blended with traditional education, compared with other types of digital education, and design variants of virtual patients in health professions education. The outcomes of interest were knowledge, skills, attitudes, and satisfaction.