Healthcare students at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) this term will be the first to step through the doors of a state-of-the-art simulation suite, giving them hands-on patient care as close as possible to the real thing.
The £1.7 million investment is part of a drive across the university to ensure modern innovative teaching methods are applied to practice-based learning.
Situated on the ground floor of Heritage House, the new purposely designed space has created three large multi-purpose teaching rooms, three cubicles for small scale teaching and demonstrations, a counselling room and student breakout spaces.
And students will be able to use this practical space to simulate a number of lifelike scenarios and practice on patient simulators without compromising the wellbeing of a real patient.
The simulation-based training solution gives students a 360-degree view of their simulation training environment and enables students to view teaching sessions at anytime from anywhere, with the ability to watch recorded sessions and review their own practice.
Additionally, patient simulators (manikins) can link into the system and produce vital signs students must respond to, followed by instant feedback through a simulation debriefing, enhancing patient safety and ensuring that students are better prepared for what is to come when practicing directly in the field.
Rachael Wimshurst Faculty Operations Manager said: “It’s all amazing and such a step forward from anything we already have. We wanted a space that you can make into anything, its adaptable, our portfolios are changing, and this meets all our needs.
“Now we have an open plan space, it can be used to make into a theatre, a crash scene, you can teach on the floor, on a bed, on the sofa and it’s just brilliant. It meets our brief completely."
All teaching spaces in the new suite have been installed with cameras, microphones, and speakers via an innovative learning technology for healthcare education known as ‘LearningSpace’.
Rachael added: “From a practical teaching point of view for clinical based programmes such as nurses, midwives, paramedics and audiologists, this is really bringing something new to the table and creating a modern way of learning for our students.
“From a Covid point of view too, it’s excellent, it was never the primary idea, but it enables us to split the class up into a much smaller class size, we can have a small number of students in the simulation space downstairs and the rest of the students can sit socially distanced in a classroom upstairs viewing a livestream of what is going on in the practice space.
“This means are all students are benefitting at the same time and are all part of the same session, then we can rotate them round.”
She continued: “Academics can also record demonstrations that students can watch as many times as they like to help improve practice, and most importantly we can record students in a session, they can then review their own work week after week, which is really beneficial to students around exam time.
“The technology also enables external examiners to review recordings as part of formal assessments, which is very beneficial in the current climate.”
Students from the Leicester School of Nursing and Midwifery, The Leicester School of Allied Health Sciences, School of Applied Social Sciences and Leicester School of Pharmacy will all benefit from these new facilities.
This is the first project the university has designed completely remotely, and it has been a huge success.
Jim Bowditch Deputy Director of Estates and Facilities said: “This is an exciting project that was all designed and constructed during the pandemic.
“It's the first project we have delivered where the majority of meetings and communications with HLS staff, Estates staff, external design consultants and the contractor have all been completed online, over a 10-month period.
“All involved adopted and embraced the new ways of working and implemented measures to work safely throughout the pandemic. The whole team worked really well together and the project has been completed to a very high standard, creating a fantastic facility that will benefit students for many years to come.”
A formal opening of the new facilities will take place once it is safe to do so.
Posted on Tuesday 9 February 2021