Escape the Ordinary: Leveraging Immersive Room Simulations to Transform Prehospital Provider Training

This presentation will synthesize current evidence regarding escape room design, implementation strategies, measured outcomes, and reported challenges across healthcare education settings. Through a comprehensive scoping review of literature from multiple databases findings will be shared on how escape rooms have been utilized in various healthcare disciplines including nursing, medicine, pharmacy, and allied health. Attendees will learn about common design elements such as puzzle integration, scenario development, environmental considerations, and facilitation approaches that have been documented in the literature.
The panel will examine what the evidence suggests about implementation strategies, including team size and composition, time constraints, difficulty calibration, debriefing techniques, and integration into broader curricula. Results will include analysis of how escape rooms have been evaluated, what outcomes have been measured, which assessment tools have been employed, and what challenges have been identified by educators implementing this approach.
The presentation will bridge these findings to the prehospital environment by discussing how documented escape room approaches might be adapted for EMS and critical care transport training. This includes considerations for incorporating clinical decision-making, team communication, resource management, and critical thinking skills specific to emergency care into escape room scenarios. Special attention will be given to the potential benefits and limitations of using escape rooms to simulate the unique challenges faced by air medical teams operating in high-stress environments with limited resources.
Attendees will gain insights into the current state of evidence for this innovative simulation modality, including its strengths, limitations, and knowledge gaps that still exist in the literature. The presentation will conclude with practical considerations for educators contemplating the integration of escape rooms within prehospital education programs, including resource requirements, faculty development needs, and evaluation strategies. This session will be valuable for educators, clinical managers, and providers interested in exploring evidence-informed approaches to simulation-based training that go beyond traditional methodologies.