Development of Immersive Virtual Reality Hospital Fire Management and Evacuation Training Program for Nursing Students in Hong Kong

Abstract

While nursing students never experience hospital fire, they should know how to evacuate the patients under their care. Using Virtual Reality (VR) can offer students a unique leaning experience of this uncommon situation. The purpose of this study was to development a VR simulation program of a hospital fire evacuation training for the nursing students and evaluated the satisfaction of the participants. It was a pilot study conducted in a local private university offering a pre-registration, higher diploma of mental health nursing program. A VR simulation program regarding fire evacuation in a psychiatric hospital was newly developed. The students enrolled in the final year of this program were recruited by convenience sampling. A questionnaire was employed to evaluate participants' satisfaction after they completing the program. Descriptive statistics was employed to analyze the participants' characteristics and quantitative results of the questionnaires. The study was approved by the institution review board of the study university. The overall satisfaction of this workshop was 4.6/5 (n = 65). The highest score was the knowledge (4.7/5), presentation and facilitation skill (4.7/5) of facilitator. Half of the students rated excellent to the design, content and facilities of this workshop. In the narrative comment, some students were satisfied with authentic 3-dimension environment at the VR cave. Besides, the students treasured the chance to act as ward in-charge in evacuation. The first immersive VR simulation program for hospital fire management was developed and generally well-received by the nursing students.