The Clinical Skills and Simulation Center Trains Health Care Professionals of the Present and Future

What are the primary functions of the Clinical Skills and Simulation Center? 

The CSSC is an innovative training environment that facilitates teaching and assessment of health professions students in an authentic clinical setting. Our learners include medical, dental, physical therapy, speech-language pathology, and nursing students, as well as resident physicians, fellows, attending physicians, local healthcare professionals and students attending regional high school health professions partnership/mentorship programs. The simulation programs developed at the CSSC have been disseminated locally and nationally. More than 1,700 learners partake in clinical skills training and assessment programs at the CSSC each year. 

What is a typical day like at the Center?

There is no typical day at the CSSC. Each morning may include simultaneous activities such as mock codes for anesthesiology residents, obstetrics and gynecology clerkship students practicing labor and delivery on task trainers, and physical therapy students utilizing the Harvey cardi-pulmonary manikins. Next, everything gets reset for an afternoon clinical skills assessment for second-year medical students that involves standardized patient (SP) examinations, note writing workshops, clinical reasoning debriefings and self-directed research exercises. Additionally, the Center houses meetings between CSSC staff and faculty to create goals and objectives for the new end of third-year graduation competency exam and hosts student organizations seeking to learn in their free time.

What is the most-asked question from faculty, staff or students about the Center? 

Students and faculty alike inquire about increased variety in the training and more access to the simulation training, which we do our best to facilitate. We are booked to max capacity yet there is still so much more we can accomplish. We are hopeful that an exciting expansion may be on the horizon.

What do you find most interesting or most rewarding as director of the Center?

As the director of the CSSC, I love that “ah-ha” look on a learner’s face when having an educational breakthrough during a simulation experience. It is a genuine connection that breathes through a living curriculum. Being the director also allows me to interact with so many members of our community, such as the Children’s Dream Foundation, which helps sharpen my focus on the real-time needs of our local patient population. Knowing that I am helping promote positive patient outcomes is beyond humbling and exhilarating. In my other role as senior director of Competency Based Assessment and Clinical Skills Education, I get to flex my love of curriculum and assessment by designing longitudinal assessment plans, implementing clinical coaching initiatives, improving workplace-based assessments for students and developing meaningful faculty development programs.

What is one useful tip you can give about the Center for students or faculty?

The more a student or faculty member can lean into an experience at the CSSC, the more they will get out of it. Simulation promotes the cycle of experiential learning. Students should feel vulnerable to celebrate their successes as much as their stumbles when participating in an activity at the CSSC. I encourage faculty to empower students to take ownership of the clinical skills they are honing and to develop a plan for incorporating lessons learned into direct patient care.

Is there a fun fact or least-known aspect about the Center?

We have more than 80 SPs on staff, some of whom have been involved with simulation for more than 25 years and were an integral part of the national movement for setting clinical skills education standards. They are made up of professional actors and specialty educators and many of them are in the Screen Actors Guild and Actor's Equity Association.