August 12, 2013By Lance Baily

SimGHOSTS Provides 172 Sim Techs with Hands-On Training at San Antonio College

simghosts 2013

Last week 172 registered attendees from all over the world came together at the San Antonio College Nursing and Allied Health Complex for the launch of the 3rd annual Gathering of Healthcare Simulation Technology Specialists, or SimGHOSTS. This beautiful 10,000 square foot simulation space was the perfect location for the 2013 event! The night of the pre-conference CAE Healthcare sponsored dinner and live country music at the famous “Little Red Barn” for 150 Sim Techs. Cowboy hats were distributed to the event team volunteers, some of whom dedicated an entire week of help to run the meeting!

The next morning, Event Chair Ryan Eling opened the meeting by sharing that his time with the organization this past year has been “an amazing growing experience”. Ryan thanked San Antonio College Interim Director Dr. Lula Westrup Pelayo, Ph.D., RN for helping to guide necessary agreement paperwork to host the SG13 event, and to help make San Antonio campus simulation staff member Joe Crain’s work to get to make this meeting such a success!


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Ryan then introduced Laerdal representative Russell Smith who was shared that he was “impressed by what the community has come together to do here”. Laerdal sponsored the keynote session given by PhD Educator Timothy Clapper, who demonstrated the need for changing healthcare through the modern day communication methods of the AHRQ TeamSTEPPS system. More about this keynote will be posted shortly.

SimGHOSTS President-Elect
Joey Failma
Senior Simulation Clinical Educator
(Linkedin Profile

Afterwords, I stepped down as President having held the positions for these past three years – however I will be remaining on as Executive Director and Board Member. This paved the way for the 2014 election race with speeches by three candidates Scott Crawford, Joey Failma and Ferooz Sekandarpoor.



With a close race, Joey Failma was elected President by the community. The new executive team of myself (Lance Baily), Mr. Failma and Ryan Eling, Event Chair, under the advice of Timothy Clapper, decided to offer Ferooz Sekandarpoor the Vice Presidency as he had the 2nd highest vote count. Ferooz was “honored” by the opportunity and accepted the position. Shortly following this, Scott Crawford was similarly accepted a Chair position on the board.  Later that night the team overwhelming supported the idea to elect Lizzy Oh, event volunteer, to the prominent position of Secretary Chair! The organization has empowered an entire team of dedicated new leadership to expand the work started by the staff of the Clinical Simulation Center of Las Vegas back in 2011!


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Throughout the rest of the event over 45 sessions took place providing hands-on training in manikin programming, hardware maintenance & repair, a/v production, EHR technology integration, LMS systems, hybrid learning platforms, moulage makeup, teamstepps communication practices, staff management and much much more. During one of the sessions, the the B-Line Sponsored DIY Video contest prizes were awarded to Ryan Douglas from St. David’s School of Nursing at Texas State University for his project “Showing Signs of Life – Adding Vital Signs to Low to Mid Fidelity Manikins for the community voted award. The grand prize was awarded to Mark Johanneck from UW Health Clinical Simulation Program for his video project on “Re-purposing Used ATLS Training Skins“, which was selected by SimGHOSTS and B-Line leadership!

Eleven medical simulation vendors attended the event and were thrilled with the opportunities provided to engage with the growing technical audience. Sim Techs traveled from as far away as Moscow and Brisbane for the 4 day event. Many of the sessions were recorded and will be posted for subscribers to SimGHOSTS.Org – so stay tuned for more great information!

Looking back, I will never forget how so many people came together to make such an amazing event – I made fantastic new friends and heard powerful messages. SimGHOSTS 2013 was an outstanding success!


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