TEACH PH II

描述（由申请人提供）：此第二阶段申请旨在开发TEACH（培训以实现文化敏感型医疗保健），这是一种基于桌面计算机的低成本产品，用于培训文化敏感型医疗保健服务。TEACH将为面对恶性肿瘤的非裔美国人（以及后来的其他种族）社区的患者以及治疗这些患者的临床医生提供服务。TEACH基于虚拟环境，为提供者提供了一个无威胁但现实的机会，以受控的方式练习文化技能，指导原则来自对患者社会文化背景和期望的研究。TEACH的创新之处在于，它利用了社会模拟、认知建模、虚拟环境和智能辅导等快速发展领域的几项技术和方法研究。在第二阶段的原型中，这些研究与新兴的但目前手工的评估和治疗方法有关，该方法是针对非裔美国人乳腺癌患者（AABCP）的。这项研究完成后，将创造一种低成本、易于传播和可复制的文化能力培训方法。此外，这里开发的技术将直接适用于治疗其他社会群体和疾病。在第二阶段，焦点小组研究和TEACH系统的有效性验证研究，包括暴露前和暴露后，构成了评估的核心。从这些经验可行性评估过程中获得的数据也将用于改进TEACH二期设计，并向三期开发，以创建一个功能齐全的TEACH产品，该产品可以根据我们的商业化计划直接生产，其临床疗效可以在正式的TEACH二期评估中进行评估，以量化其对患者和临床医生的价值。TEACH的商业潜力在很大程度上源于对AABCP护理的关键独特方面的日益认识，其中生物和社会文化因素影响着我们为值得的人群提供最佳护理的能力。这一努力将产生一种基于计算机的、类似游戏的产品，为包括内科和外科肿瘤学研究员在内的内部员工项目的学员提供护理非裔美国人乳腺癌患者（AABCP）的真实模拟体验。重点将特别放在文化能力的问题上。该产品将使用户，无论是实习医生还是毕业医生和其他临床医生，都能与游戏角色互动，为少数民族患者提供机会，加强对恶性肿瘤疾病生活经历的移情理解。完成后，该研究将为AABCP的评估和辅助管理创造一种低成本、易于分发和易于复制的方法。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This Phase II application seeks to develop TEACH (Training to Enable & Achieve Culturally Sensitive Healthcare), a low-cost desktop-computer-based product for training culturally sensitive healthcare delivery. TEACH will serve patients from the African-American (and later other ethnic) communities confronting malignancy, as well as the clinicians who treat these patients. TEACH is based on a virtual environment that gives providers a non-threatening but realistic opportunity to practice cultural skills in a controlled manner, guided by well-validated precepts derived from studies of patients' socio-cultural context and expectations. TEACH is innovative in that it utilizes several lines of research in technologies and methods in the rapidly evolving domains of social simulation, cognitive modeling, virtual environments, and intelligent tutoring. Those lines of research are connected with emerging but currently manual methods for assessment and treatment, in the prototype for Phase II, of the African-American breast cancer patient (AABCP). When completed, this research will create a low-cost, easily-distributed, and replicable method for training in cultural competency. In addition, the technology developed here will be directly applicable to treatment of other social groups and disorders. In Phase II, focus group studies and validation studies of the efficacy of the TEACH system, both pre- and post-exposure, form the evaluative core. Data from these empirical feasibility assessment procedures will also be used to refine the TEACH Phase II design and build toward Phase III to create a fully-functional TEACH product that can be directly productized according to our commercialization plan, and whose clinical efficacy can be assessed in a formal Phase II assessment of TEACH to quantify its value to both patients and clinicians. The commercial potential for TEACH arises in large part from the increasing awareness of key distinctive aspects of the care of the AABCP, wherein both biological and socio-cultural factors impinge on our ability to furnish optimal care to a deserving population. This effort will produce a computer-based, game-like product that will provide trainees in house staff programs, including medical and surgical oncology fellows, with a realistic simulation experience of caring for African-American breast cancer patients (AABCP). Stress will be placed particularly on issues of cultural competency. The product will enable users, be they trainee or graduate physicians and other clinicians, to interact with game characters that provide the opportunity to enhance empathic understanding of the lived experience of illness from malignancy, as felt by patients in minority populations. When completed, the research will create a low-cost, easily-distributed and easily-replicated method for assessment and adjunctive management of AABCP.