Simulation Saves the Day (and Patient).

ABSTRACT

Surgeons can use simulation to improve the safety of the systems they work within, around, because of, and despite. Health care is a complex adaptive system that can never be completely knowable; simulation can expose aspects of patient care delivery that are not necessarily evident prospectively, during planning, or retrospectively, during investigations or audits. The constraints of patient care processes and adaptive capacity of health care providers may become most evident during simulations conducted "in situ" using real teams and real equipment, in actual patient care locations.