Moving forward in patient safety: Multidisciplinary team training

Communication and teamwork deficiencies have been identified as major contributors to poor clinical outcomes in the labor and delivery unit. In response to these findings, multidisciplinary simulation-based team training techniques have developed to focus specifically on skills training for teams. The evidence demonstrates that multidisciplinary simulation-based team training minimizes poor outcomes by perfecting the elusive teamwork skills that cannot be taught in a didactic setting. Multidisciplinary simulation-based team training is also being used to detect latent system errors in existing or new units, to rehearse complicated procedures (surgical dress rehearsal), and to identify knowledge gaps of labor and delivery teams. Multidisciplinary simulation-based team training should be an integral component of ongoing quality-improvement efforts to ultimately produce teams of experts that perform proficiently.