Psychiatric Students Evaluation of Learning in a Simulated Environment.

 The aim of the paper is to report the undergraduate psychiatric students experiences of a simulated mental health ward prior to their internship.  The METI Simulation Effectiveness Scale was adapted to evaluate the students experiences.   The Mental Health Ward is an innovative, simulated hospital environment that includes the use of standardized patients and role play scenarios resulting in a full mission simulation where students learn a variety of psychiatric diagnoses, and practice a variety of skills including nursing assessments, the admission process, the discharge process, medication administration, therapeutic communication, and patient education groups.  The students can also be involved in high risk areas such as handling aggressive, suicidal and homicidal patients.  The developed infrastructure of the Mental Health Ward will be reviewed and a  research study conducted to evaluate the outcomes of  learning in the simulated experience. will be presented. The METI Simulation Effectiveness Scale will be utilized as the tool in the study to evaluate  self efficacy and communication techniques utilized by the nursing students in the simulated experience.