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NEWS
| february 17, 2004
Nursing
School eyes simulated hospital for
training
The dean seeks funds for the facility
that could become the nation’s 1st of its kind.
By Connie
Yu
The Shorthorn Staff
Nursing Dean Elizabeth Poster has a vision of an on-campus hospital,
where students could have hands-on experience in patient diagnosis
from treatment administration to performance evaluation before they
provide care to real patients.
And, unlike other at hospitals, students here would be free to make
mistakes, she said.
With many virtual technologies becoming less expensive and a growing
shortage in nurses, school officials said they are confident they
will acquire support for a virtual health care system that could
offer multiple simulated patients, medical equipment and research
opportunities for health care reform.
But more importantly, it could revolutionize education in nursing
with a stronger implementation on simulation technology, she said.
“We have the desire to do it,” Dr. Poster said. “We
know that it’s the direction we must go in terms of the emergence
of modern technology.”
Though details on the hospital’s construction have not been
decided, Poster said she is working to secure funding from congressional
appropriations, agency grants, donations and partnerships with local
hospitals.
In one such effort, Poster unveiled the plan at a luncheon Friday
for a group of local health providers and city leaders. She told
her guests — including U.S. Rep. Joe Barton, State Rep. Bill
Zedler, Arlington Mayor Robert Cluck and some hospital representatives
—that the plan would reduce the cost of workforce training
in hospitals, lessen the pressure of the nurse shortage and provide
a facility for disaster and emergency relief.
The simulated patients could interact with the students to exhibit
symptoms of different diseases and respond to treatments. With multiple
patients, students can also practice making medical judgments that
are critical in the clinical practice, Poster said.
If Poster secures the $40 million, the hospital could become the
first of its kind in the nation, she said.
Though officials have not selected a location for the hospital,
Poster said the facility, planned for 100,000 square-feet could
be completed in five years.
“I’d like to see it to move along fairly rapidly,”
she said. “I’d like to do it now.”
The school currently has only one simulated patient, and Poster
said she plans to secure federal funding in her trip to Washington
in March for a $4 million congressional appropriation that will
fund the first phase of the project with an emergency center at
the school and four simulated patients.
Zedler said he supports the hospital plan and will work with Poster
and others to secure the funds.
“My goal here today is really to take a problem that many
of us here have overlooked and try and to bring it more toward the
center of the radar screen,” he said.
Susan Grove, associate dean for masters of science in nursing programs,
said the simulation training could help increasing the proficiency
in skill training, such as suture operation and intubation.
“If [students] make mistakes,” she said, “they
can go back and retrain with the simulated mannequins.”
A spokesperson for Wayne Clark, president and chief executive officer
of Arlington Memorial Hospital, said Clark supports the project,
but did not know yet if the hospital would participate financially.
“He certainly is supportive of the whole concept,” the
spokesperson said. “Certainly in training, the mannequins
can simulate situations that students never would have had the opportunity
to experience before.”
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| “We
know that it’s the direction we must go in terms
of the emergence of modern technology.”
Elizabeth Poster
Nursing dean.
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