Medical & Healthcare Simulation
For over 13 years, we have delivered an unrivalled quality of service in the field of patient simulation across medicine and healthcare. Our expert team have worked in the field of medical and healthcare simulation, and communication skills training, for the majority of their professional careers.
We provide a dedicated, highly competitive ‘turnkey’ service to our clients.
As part of our work in Medical and Healthcare Simulation, we’re training roleplay actors, delivering and facilitating events from large scale assessments to smaller examinations, delivering tailored teaching and training sessions, devising bespoke learning programmes, writing and reviewing scenarios, and consulting on best practice guidance within the world of roleplay and simulation.
Peel Roleplay’s Simulated Patients have supported communication skills programmes, training events and assessments for many prestigious Universities and Medical Schools across the UK, undertaking a wide range of roles and scenarios.
Peel Roleplay’s current major contracts are with medical, healthcare, dental, pharmacy and psychology departments for undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and assessment, and include the management of the Regional Simulated Patient Resource for Yorkshire and The Humber (a training and assessment service available to all healthcare professionals and trainees in the region and beyond). Our ad hoc service clients include various NHS Trusts and hospitals, GP Recruitment, Royal Colleges, Cancer Network and a number of private clients and individuals.

We currently manage role play provision for the following:
- Medical, Dental & Pharmacy OSCE
- GP, Nurse & Staff Training & Professional Exams
- Anatomy Model & Physical Examination
- Assessments in Mental Health Nursing, Physician Associate, Radiotherapy, Occupational Therapy, Psychiatry, T Level Health & More
- Clinical Associate in Psychology (CAP) End Point Assessments
- Communication & Clinical Skills Teaching Programmes
Our dedicated team enable your students to;
- Build their verbal and non-verbal communication skills
- Learn how to navigate challenging conversations
- Consider dignity, respect and patient autonomy
- Handle emotionally charged and mental health presentations
- Take comprehensive social and medical histories
- Practice observations and physical assessment
Recruitment
We recruit and train the most experienced actors for our partners. Recruitment is ongoing, with our applications system always open to those who are interested in applying, or just interested in finding out more about this important work. We provide a friendly, clear application process that encourages submissions from a range of candidates – this is essential to us, ensuring our database reflects the diversity of the UK population.
Peel’s ‘Gateway Training’ has been designed by us to allow all actors who are new role players to obtain a deep and thorough understanding of guiding principles and techniques of medical roleplay simulation. In addition, our bespoke training programmes are designed and delivered in accordance with specific partner needs, ensuring standardisation.
Roleplay and Simulation
Peel Roleplay is the UK’s leading role player and simulated patient providers. We are a specialist provider and leader in the industry, working in close collaboration with our clients to develop the use of simulation in medical training and high stakes assessment.
Our specialist medical roleplay cohort includes over 700 of the UK’s most experienced Simulated Patient role players. They have a vast range of knowledge, allowing them to portray patients, relatives and healthcare professionals with accuracy and sincerity. Our role players reflect the diversity of the UK population across age, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, religion, disability and other characteristics.
All of our trained role players have experience working across large-scale assessments (e.g. OSCEs – a standard assessment tool used by medical and other healthcare professional schools), many also with the specialist skills required to deliver roleplay for complex communication skills teaching sessions. Such workshops are used to assess a person’s clinical competence, including their applied knowledge, history taking and physical examination skills, communication skills, clinical reasoning and patient management.
Programme Management
Our robust programme management systems, developed over many years, ensure reliable attendance and delivery of all sessions and events. We aim to ensure that logistics, arrangements and bookings are made with 100% accuracy and reliability, such that the focus can always remain on the important issues at hand: effective learning and assessment.
Whether for face to face or online sessions, Peel Roleplay delivers consistent, unrivalled programme management, providing our partners with the best, highly experienced role players for your organisation, trainees and candidates; ensuring the best outcome.
As part of our programme management, a dedicated Project Manager is appointed and partners are provided with 24/7 access to a member of our team.
Training and Development
Experiential learning using actors provides a level of engagement and potential for change which simply cannot be rivalled.
Our quality assured programmes, covering topics such as ‘Dignity and Respect’, ‘Care and Compassion’ and ‘Patient Experience’ to name a few, help develop safe, effective cultures of care for patients.












“[The SPs] worked with excellence on the sessions and [we] really appreciated your flexibility and your responsiveness with the need to improvise.”
– Sarah Bradley, Senior Clinical Skills Tutor, University of Exeter Medical School
Scenario Development
Peel Roleplay have extensive experience writing medical and healthcare practice scenarios, both independently and in collaboration with our client partners. The degree of client input into scenario writing depends on the level of clinical detail, subject material, complexity and level of the student course.
Our Simulated Patient Actors have supported roles and scenarios for UK healthcare education settings on the following topics:-
- Triadic Communication
- End of Life Communication
- Communication with Parent & Child
- Emotive Conversations
- Communication Skills Consolidation
- Challenging Consultations / Discussing Difficult News
- Explanation & Planning
- Motivational Interviewing
- Obstetrics & Gynaecological History
- Diagnosis of Death
- Initiating the Session
- Breaking Bad News & Grieving and Anger
- Sexual Lifestyle Advice / Sexual History
- Challenging Stereotypes
- Prescribing Communication
- Building the Relationship
- Shared Decision Making
- Making Sense of Evidence
- Assessment of Conscious Level
- Mental Health History / Mental State Examination
- Acute Presentations such as; Psychiatric, Medication Review, Abdominal Pain
- Giving Information
- Palliative Care
- Telephone Handover
- Capacity to Consent
- Talking to a Bereaved Relative
- Review to Assess Risk
- Long Term Disability
- Paediatric Neurology Outpatient Review
- Remote Consultation
- Blood Transfusion
- Cognitive Assessment
- Physical examinations in teaching and assessment such as; ECG, Respiratory, Cardiovascular, Gastrointestinal, GALS, Ultrasound, Thyroid, Orthopaedic, Neurology, Cranial Nerve, Musculoskeletal, Ear, Nose & Throat, Eye, Breast, Blood Pressure, Hybrid stations involving models/manikins/wearable prosthetics.
- Filming of benchmarking videos for clinical competency examinations, other filmed examinations/consultations for the purpose of producing video learning resources etc.
Course types supported by our Simulated Patient Actor provision have included:-
- Assessment (including OSCE/ISCE/CASC/EPA) across the following programmes;
- Medical,
- Physician Associate,
- Pharmacy, Dental,
- Radiotherapy,
- Mental Health Nursing,
- Occupational Therapy,
- Clinical Associate in Psychology
- T Level Health
- Communication for Clinical Practice (CCP) and teaching across Medicine & Dentistry
- LivDocSim and FY1 PracTiSCE – simulated ward/communication skills hybrid programmes for 5th year / FY1 medical students preparing for practice
- Various clinical and non-clinical staff training workshops including;
- Tutor Development/Facilitation,
- Psychiatry Simulations,
- Difficult Conversations,
- Equality & Diversity,
- International Nurses Leadership Training
Peel Roleplay have also designed and delivered our own courses on:-
- Diversity and Inclusion
- Preceptorship and Mentorship
- Basic Communication Skills
- Dealing with Bereavement
- Giving feedback
- Child Criminal Exploitation
- Violence Against Women and Girls
- Social Anxiety
Contact Us
If you’re looking for professional Simulated Patient provision please get in touch.