LINCOLN, Neb.— The flesh-like rubber arms and hands splayed out on a table look very real — too real, in some cases — but it’s the artificial blood oozing from a wound that really pulls it all together.
That’s a good thing, at least for the future nurses learning the skills they’ll use regularly at the Nursing Simulator Center at Union College.
The growing center, which just opened a $350,000 expansion in January gives 100 students the chance to practice hard skills like starting an IV or fitting a central line, and soft skills like teamwork and critical thinking in a setting that resembles a real hospital, the Lincoln Journal Star reported.
“We want students to come on a shift just like they would at a hospital,” said Tracy Hagele, center coordinator.
Students start in the tasking room, where they learn to find a vein or insert a catheter on the artificial arms and hands fleshy enough to seem real.
If a mistake is made — a missed vein in the arm, for example — the artificial limbs bleed, which “makes it a little more realistic,” said Rebecca Randa, a clinical instructor at Union College.
Upon mastering those individual skills, students move on to assessing and treating one of the four simulator manikins Union has been using for the better part of the last decade while instructors watch from behind mirrored glass.
“We are behind the glass letting them make decisions,” Randa said. “We can change the situation depending on what they choose to do and they can learn to independently make those choices.”
