Design, development, and impact evaluation of a digital simulation platform in higher education: The case of medical students

Abstract

Recent technological developments have significantly transformed health professions education, promoting the integration of e-learning and simulation-based strategies for teaching clinical and procedural skills. In medical training, early acquisition of basic care procedures is often constrained by ethical considerations, limited access to clinical environments, and increasing student enrollment. These limitations underline the necessity for complementary digital tools that can support students before and after clinical immersion. This study aimed to design, implement, and evaluate MedTuto, a multiresource digital pedagogical platform developed to enhance the teaching of basic care procedures for first-year medical students. MedTuto was structured as an e-learning kit integrating organized theoretical content, detailed technical sheets, simulation-based instructional videos, and formative assessments through interactive quizzes. The platform was introduced as a complement to a three-week immersion internship in basic care at the Faculty of Medicine, Pharmacy, and Dentistry of Fez to reinforce procedural knowledge and optimize simulation-supported learning. A quantitative quasiexperimental pretest/posttest design was conducted with 240 first-year medical students randomly assigned to an experimental group (n = 120), which accessed MedTuto, and a control group (n = 120), which followed the standard curriculum. The experimental group completed both pre-test and post-test assessments, whereas the control group completed only the post-test. Knowledge acquisition was assessed using validated multiple-choice questionnaires.Knowledge acquisition was assessed using validated multiple-choice questionnaires. Descriptive statistics and Student’s t tests were applied to evaluate intra- and inter-group differences. The results showed a significant improvement in academic performance among students using MedTuto. Experimental group scores increased significantly between pretest and posttest (+2.63 points, p < 0.001; Hedges' g = 0.64). Posttest scores were also significantly higher compared with the control group (+2.60 points, p < 0.001; Hedges' g = 0.82).). MedTuto appears to be an effective tool for strengthening procedural learning and supporting self-directed education in undergraduate medical training.