And it's Kimberly Ream's job to interpret what she hears through her stethoscope.
Ream, a sophomore awaiting admission to the School of Nursing, is perturbed that she can't do more for her patient. He lies there, helpless, in his hospital bed, his comfy Spartan socks poking out from under the covers.
“I know there's something wrong with you,” she tells him sympathetically. “But at this point in our careers, we can't really do anything to help.”
Her classmate Byron Haddock shakes his head. He's glad, he says, that this patient isn't flesh and blood but a programmable mannequin known as SimMan. “There's not nearly as much pressure.”
SimMan, a $40,000 piece of equipment manufactured by the Texas-based company Laerdal, is the “hot buzz word now in health education,” says Dr. Dorothy Herron, clinical associate professor of nursing. He was initially used by the military for CPR training, and demand for him has skyrocketed in nursing schools across the country.
“More and more nursing schools are using him,” Herron says. “If you think about it, there are only so many real patients students can work on. There are only so many in [the local] hospital's ICU. And, of course, we have to be safe. Some patients don't need multitudinous nursing students assessing them.”
He's so useful, in fact, that the nursing school is investing in a second SimMan.
Beginning students like Ream and Haddock first meet him in Nursing 220, Physical Assessment. Herron says the mannequin is used for very basic purposes as these students won't actually enter the nursing school until their junior year. But they can learn to detect abnormal breathing and take vital signs such as respiration rate, heart rate and blood pressure.
Advanced students practice catheterizations, drawing blood and giving intramuscular injections. They also encounter “code” scenarios. The operator can pre-program SimMan to “crash” gradually. Student decisions about which medicines and techniques to use are all that stands between life and death for him.
“He'll be going down the tubes,” Herron says. “They have to supply what he needs or he is going to die.”
An operator can “speak” for SimMan through a microphone system, and students can watch their performance on web cam recordings.
“That's the important thing, the debriefing,” Herron says. “Did they look at ease? Did they work together as a team?”
And, yes, with the addition and deletion of certain features SimMan can become SimWoman.
His ability to become her, can be useful to train students in the different techniques for urinary catheterization, Herron says. “Sometimes he speaks with a woman's voice even though he's SimMan.”
By Michelle Hines, University Relations
Photoography by Chris English, University Relations
