Focus on Education

Virtual reality is nowv

Lab coordinators and clinical instructors showed agility in the COVID-19 pandemic by swiftly converting classes and clinicals to virtual formats and fi nding other creative ways to replace in-person experiences.

When word came down from the University of Illinois System in mid-March 2020 that all in-person classes would migrate online to prevent the spread of COVID-19, it presented a special challenge for nursing clinical instructors.

How do you give nursing students a clinical experience without being in a clinic?

Clinical faculty and lab coordinators quickly rose to the challenge by turning to a virtual simulation program called iHuman. Using avatar patients, bachelor’s and graduate-level students could read patients’ charts, ask questions, and even check the patients’ heartbeats from the safety of home. Via videoconference, faculty met with students before seeing the patient and led a debrief after.

“Our goal was to replicate the experiences our students would typically receive in clinical settings or the lab with virtual software, and for our graduating seniors, to give them the skills they need to graduate and enter the workforce,” says Catherine Vincent, PhD, RN, associate dean for academic affairs.

On-site clinical rotations returned in the fall, as well as classes in the simulation labs. Students are rotated through both, in addition to some virtual training. Safety precautions are in place, such as disinfecting spaces and equipment between sessions, and requiring masks and frequent hand washing.

The state-of-the-art M. Christine Schwartz Experiential & Simulation Laboratory on the lower level of the Chicago campus, which opened in fall 2019, has proved itself to be invaluable, says Susan Kilroy, MSN, RN, director of the UIC Nursing Clinical Learning Resource Center. The Schwartz Lab’s size—15,000-square feet—and realistic environment (with ER, birthing suite, nurse practitioner rooms, home health suite and more) makes it adaptable for safely training students during the pandemic.

“The Schwartz Lab has been a lifesaver,” Kilroy says. “We’re so grateful to have this large learning space because we can break it into smaller rooms to keep class sizes small.” For instance, Kilroy says instructors are using the Schwartz Lab’s Team-Based Learning room—equipped with a central camera and microphone, small-group seating and fl at screens at each table—to give bachelor’s degree students an opportunity to practice patient education on standardized patients, or trained actors who play the parts of patients. To keep the standardized patients safe, they don’t come to campus as they usually would; instead, they’re streamed in on a videoconference platform. Students interact with the patient as if they were assisting a nurse practitioner on a telehealth appointment.

“Our instructors have shown incredible creativity by fi nding ways to deliver needed competencies and skills in the face of curtailed in-person opportunities, and our students are responding with impressive adaptability and fl exibility,” Vincent says.

iHuman, a virtual simulation program, presents avatar patients that let students do everything from read patient charts to check heartbeats.

Marlene Sefton teaching summer classes at a social distance in the spacious Team-Based Learning classroom of the Schwartz Lab