Simulators and difficult airway management skills

Although difficult airway management remains one of the leading factors in anaesthetic deaths, there have been tremendous advances in the field in the last few decades. The question is, are advanced airway management skills being taught and used? Of the numerous training tools available, simulators have the advantages of providing whole-task learning with the potential to change behaviour and, when applied to large groups of trainees, the possibility of achieving standardized application of the safest practices for a range of scenarios limited only by the creativity of the program designers. Partial-task trainers include computer-based software programs and simulators. Full-scale simulators include a variety of products from several manufacturers. To take full advantage of simulators as educational tools, curricula should be designed around a set of educational objectives that address the objectives of learning in all three skill domains (cognitive, psychomotor, and affective). Simulation experiences using partial-task or whole-task trainers should be coupled whenever feasible with a structured clinical experience in airway management. This can best be achieved through a dedicated airway management rotation. Monitored procedure logs may also be used. Whether using a simulator or in a clinical rotation, experiences should be graded, for example, gaining experience in an adult population before gaining experience in paediatrics and in each population mastering airway management skills for common scenarios before advancing to more complicated techniques such as fibreoptic bronchoscopy.