Edinburgh Simulated Patient Programme

The Simulated Patient programme supports training and assessment of medical students and professionals with a team of volunteers portraying real patients

The programme supports training and assessment of medical students and professionals, with our team of dedicated volunteers featuring in many different arenas such as communication skills teaching sessions, examinations, and teaching video's /online learning packages.
A Simulated Patient is someone who has been trained to portray characteristics of a real patient in order to provide an opportunity for medical students to learn about doctor- patient interactions.
The Simulated Patient Programme was introduced to meet the needs of a re-structured and developed curriculum that aimed to equip students with the skills, competencies, attributes, and attitudes that would allow them to function effectively, and confidently, as a doctor following graduation. Therefore, it was believed important that students were given the opportunity to interact with patients from an early stage in their training. The programme allows these interactions to happen in a safe and relaxed enviroment.