On 19 January, members of the PRESTIGE-AF team from Imperial College London ran the PRESTIGE-AF Escape Room at the University of Würzburg’s 6th Joint Winter School in translational medicine and clinical science.
This year’s theme was ‘Stroke: research, challenges and international perspectives’, and included presentations on topics ranging from stroke epidemiology and risk factors to drivers in inequalities to post-stroke care.
As part of the programme, PRESTIGE-AF presented the escape room as a novel form of communicating research and ran four sessions for the attendees to try. Working as a team, the groups had to tackle various puzzles – from a brain MRI scan jigsaw to performing a blood spot that magically made the code to a locked case appear – in order to find out the information required to enrol a patient onto the PRESTIGE-AF clinical trial.
Hard work and determination meant all teams managed to enrol their patient and escape the clinic, and feedback showed that the participants enjoyed themselves and valued the escape room format, with one participant commenting that they “got to know a really cool new form of science communication. I’ve never done a medicine themed escape room before and really enjoyed doing one!”
It was great to be able to take our flagship engagement activity to another of PRESTIGE-AF’s partner institutions, and we look forward to continuing our work on this throughout the year.
