Achi news desk-
A new Calgary simulation lab uses life-like models and recreates emergency emergency situations so doctors can practice, perform and improve their medical skills to save lives.
The Teach, Simulate, Innovate and Activate (eSIM) lab opened at the Peter Lougheed Center on Thursday, helping various healthcare professionals improve their practical response to events such as cardiac arrest, asthma attacks, anaphylactic shock and even childbirth .
“A hospital is just a building and tools are just tools, but what makes or breaks quality safe healthcare are the teams, that’s where the magic is, to synchronize with it each other,” says simulation consultant Hanin Omar.
“During the last few months, we have been rehearsing these types of incidents and I have heard from some of our learners who have faced these situations in real life afterwards and know exactly what to do .”
The models range from infants to geriatric patients.
Each can simulate vital signs, breathing, coughing, bleeding and sweating, and can even have brief conversations with doctors via computer audio.
Clinical nurse educator Nicole Rogi is one of the healthcare professionals who regularly uses simulation tools to guide others through simulations.
Medical models can be seen in the Peter Lougheed Centre’s new eSIM lab on Thursday, April 4, 2024.She says the real benefit comes from a full-class debriefing following the exercise, which allows first responders to discover what they did right or what strategies could be improved.
“We’ve done everything from cardiac arrests, which is what we call Code Blue at the hospital, all the way to narcotic overdoses by injecting Narcan,” Rogi said.
“What I like about simulation is that we reduce the stress on the learners, so they can get those key takeaway points that we’ve been teaching. It becomes a very safe place to learn with the pre-briefs and the debriefing.”
Simulation technologist Dan Duperron works behind the scenes to program the models and simulate medical situations.
It helps by showing healthcare workers real-time data, including how effective their chest compressions are, during the exercise.
“We can control many aspects of the simulator from their breathing pattern to the ECG basics. We can do streaming audio, we can control their eye movements, their blinking and many functions,” he said.
“These are all great teaching devices, and we can do real-time feedback, so they have CPR feedback, or we can monitor that in real time and use that during the debriefing.”
Medical models can be seen in the Peter Lougheed Centre’s new eSIM lab on Thursday, April 4, 2024.Alberta now has 14 eSIM labs, primarily located in each of the larger hospitals across the province, but mobile rural simulations are also being used to support educators and healthcare teams in more remote locations .
The province’s eSIM program director, Jason Laberge, says the new and larger purpose-built simulation lab at the Peter Lougheed Center will do much to improve patient outcomes and ultimately save lives.
“Being able to provide this type of service and this type of support to our teams is extremely rewarding,” he said.
