Travel restrictions, physical distancing, and limits to clinical placements due to the global pandemic raised enormous challenges for genetic counseling education in 2020. In response, we created authentic virtual clinical experiences in our Master of Genetic Counseling program, mimicking clinical practice: virtual simulation with standardized clients, and virtual clinical placements, including intake calls, triage, consultations, teamwork and time management, and genetic counseling with standardized clients. The virtual clinical experiences involved online pre-brief, simulation, and debrief. We aimed to evaluate students’ satisfaction with this learning method. Between April and November 2020, we distributed an anonymous online survey to all participating students using a modified version of a validated satisfaction with simulation scale. We analyzed the combined responses from first- and second-year virtual clinical experiences using descriptive statistics and content analysis. The total number of possible responses was 120. The mean response rate was 68.36% (n = 82.03), with a mean of 16.41 participants responding to each survey from each year group. Of the first-year participants, 53% (n = 10) had not observed a genetic counseling consultation before attending the virtual clinical placement. Overall, 92.5% of responses indicated that students were satisfied with the virtual clinical experiences (SD = 0.05). 100% (n = 82) of responses indicated that working with standardized clients was beneficial to learning, encouraged reflection on clinical ability and was a valuable learning experience overall. However, 37.78% (n = 17) of those who participated in the virtual simulation found that the use of Zoom detracted from their clinical learning. The virtual clinical experiences increased first-year students’ confidence about clinical placement and prepared second-year students for telehealth. In conclusion, the adaptation to virtual clinical experiences enhanced learning for most students, prepared them for practice, met the requirements of the accreditation body and enabled all of our final year students to graduate on time.

中文翻译：

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适应全球大流行对遗传咨询师教育的挑战：评估学生对虚拟临床体验的满意度

由于全球大流行而导致的旅行限制、身体距离和临床实习限制给 2020 年的遗传咨询教育带来了巨大挑战。 作为回应，我们在遗传咨询硕士课程中创建了真实的虚拟临床体验，模仿临床实践：虚拟模拟与标准化客户和虚拟临床安置，包括接诊电话、分类、咨询、团队合作和时间管理，以及与标准化客户的遗传咨询。虚拟临床体验包括在线预简报、模拟和汇报。我们旨在评估学生对这种学习方法的满意度。在 2020 年 4 月至 11 月期间，我们使用经过验证的模拟满意度量表的修改版本，向所有参与的学生分发了一份匿名在线调查。我们使用描述性统计和内容分析分析了第一年和第二年虚拟临床经验的综合反应。可能的响应总数为 120。平均响应率为 68.36% (n  = 82.03)，平均有 16.41 名参与者对来自每一年组的每项调查做出回应。在第一年的参与者中，53% ( n  = 10) 在参加虚拟临床实习之前没有接受遗传咨询咨询。总体而言，92.5% 的回答表明学生对虚拟临床体验感到满意 ( SD  = 0.05)。100% ( n  = 82) 的答复表明，与标准化客户一起工作有益于学习，鼓励对临床能力的反思，并且总体上是一种宝贵的学习经验。然而，37.78% ( n = 17) 参加虚拟模拟的人发现 Zoom 的使用影响了他们的临床学习。虚拟临床体验增加了一年级学生对临床实习的信心，并为二年级学生的远程医疗做好了准备。总之，对虚拟临床体验的适应增强了大多数学生的学习，为实践做好了准备，满足了认证机构的要求，并使我们所有的最后一年学生都能按时毕业。