A High-Fidelity Patient Simulator is a clinical simulation training product that enables both learners and educators to be able to practice clinical skills in healthcare simulation based education. With the use of a High-Fidelity Patient Simulator this training can occur in real-time and the patient simulator can respond as different treatment and care is provided. Improvements in technology since the mid twentieth century have meant that there has been a number of advancements made in the way that human patient simulators are represented. “High Fidelity” in this context means “highly lifelike”, and at time the term “High-Fidelity Manikins” may be used instead.
High-Fidelity Patient Simulator: Healthcare Simulation Definition
Patient simulators in healthcare simulation are used to assist in the advancement of clinical skills of healthcare staff through hands-on learning, patient assessment and teamwork. The use of highest-fidelity patient simulators has shown that the creation of opportunities for healthcare simulation learners of all levels and backgrounds to develop and practice clinical and team based skills improves patient outcomes and identifies system based latent safety threats.
High-Fidelity Manikins have become incredibly important for learners to be able to have an environment to respond and react to high-risk clinical scenarios which may occur to patients. The opportunity to practice on a patient simulator gives learners an opportunity to become more prepared to manage immediate reactions to critical clinical situations. With practice healthcare simulation learners can sharpen their ability to maintain a steady hand and expert focus. The opportunity to practice on a patient simulator can also reduce the need for supervision in many clinical patient encounters.
Usability of High Fidelity Patient Simulators in Clinical Simulation
Aside from safety and practice, high-fidelity patient simulators are known to have a number of other advantages when compared to traditional medical education. High Fidelity Patient simulators are designed to be easily transportable, durable and can be set up in most environments with no time restrictions. This can assist to reduce barriers to healthcare simulation based education.
Convenience is also demonstrated by the ability of educators to be able to provide feedback after a patient simulator experience. Due to immediate feedback after use of a patient simulator, learners are able to identify errors and then improve their clinical practice in future clinical simulation or patient encounters. To be given feedback while the clinical encounter or experience is still “fresh” helps learners to be able to reflect on and correct mistakes in a timely manner.
Unique capabilities that a high-fidelity human patient simulator is able to offer are variable but can include: blood pressure, pulse, reactive pupils, variable respiration rate, sweating, and the ability to respond verbally when activated to. High-Fidelity Patient simulators can also simulate certain neurological conditions such as seizure and can allow for neurological assessment and treatment.
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There are a number of healthcare simulation products available on the market for a clinical simulation service or organization. As much as technology progresses and new technology is forever producing new products, patient simulators remain the fundamental basis of the majority of most healthcare simulation programs across the globe. High Fidelty Patient simulators come in a vast array of costs and use abilities. As much as a high fidelity and high cost patient simulator is appealing, there can still be much successful healthcare simulation based education to be found from a low cost and low fidelity patient simulator.
High-Fidelity Patient Simulator Examples from Laerdal
Laerdal is a patient simulator company which was founded in 1940 and is headquartered in Stavanger, Norway. Laerdal produces a number of patient simulator products across the globe. Laerdal’s fleet of patient simulators varies based on age, gender and other factors. These factors assist learners to understand specific needs of different types of patients. Laerdal’s patient simulator product lines on the market include but are not limited to: SimMan 3G Plus, SimMom, SimJunior, SimNewB, Premature Anne and SimBaby.
SimMan 3G Plus is a high fidelity patient manikin that can display a number of different clinical signs and symptoms. SimMan 3G Plus is easy to use and features a number of innovative technologies. Emergency services and military organizations often utilize SimMan based on the product’s adapted training for rapid assessment of trauma emergencies.
SimMom is an advanced full body high-fidelity birthing patient simulator that comes with life-like anatomy. This product provides learners with the functionality to facilitate a number of multi-professional obstetric education of birth management. SimMom comes with both manual and automatic delivery modes dependant on the clinical simulation scenario requirements. Obstetric simulation helps learners understand how to make quick clinical decisions in childbirth, which can ultimately mean the difference between life and death for patients in clinical practice.
Sim Junior is an interactive pediatric patient simulator which was designed by Laerdal alongside the American Academy of Pediatrics. SimJunior delivers a realistic, full-body high-fidelity patient simulator for pediatric emergencies, and closely represents the body of a 6-year-old boy. The healthcare simulation product allows learners to focus on a broad range of pediatric clinical skills in order to gain exposure and practical experience of life-threatening pediatric problems.
SimNewB is a tetherless patient simulator, also co-created with the American Academy of Pediatrics. This high-fidelity product is designed to help improve neonatal resuscitation and to meet the specific learning objectives of neonatal resuscitation protocols. Focusing on the first 10 minutes of life, SimNewB provides realistic training for critical interventions, such as lung recruitment maneuvers and advanced airway management.
Premature Anne helps learners understand how to specifically provide care to a premature infant. Realistically proportioned as a 25-week preterm Patient Simulator, Premature Anne is designed to facilitate the training of healthcare professionals in the initiation of proper care and resuscitation of preterm infants. Laerdal has also collaborated with SIMCharacters to create SIMCharacters’ Paul which is a highly realistic 27 week old preterm infant.
SimBaby is another advanced infant patient simulator that is ideal for clinical simulation based education in all aspects of infant care. With realistic anatomy and clinical functionality, SimBaby is suitable for all types of clinical simulation from routine care to critical emergencies. The SimBaby patient simulator allows learners to assess capillary refill times, test pupillary light reflexes, check bilateral pulses and more.
Pediatric patients often have different physiological responses to trauma and medical emergencies in comparison to teens and adults. Recognition of these subtle differences and learning how to respond in clinical care to respiratory emergencies, shock and cardiopulmonary arrest in this patient population is imperative to improved clinical care. These patient simulators help learners to improve healthcare professionals abilities to respond effectively to all clinical, nursing and emergency situations.
Other High-Fidelity Patient Simulator Brands
Other high-fidelity patient simulators are available from Gaumard, Elevate Healthcare, Nasco Healthcare, MedVision, and a multitude of other medical simulation vendors.
Elevate Healthcare’s patient simulator products cover a range of ages from infant through to adult. Elevate Healthcare’s high-fidelity patient simulators use a range of sophisticated mathematical models to be able to reflect human physiology and influences on physiology such as medication, equipment and pathologies. The physiological models are able to adapt to any learner interventions which are based on the patient’s age, weight and underlying conditions. Elevate Healthcare has several high fidelity manikins in their range for newborn, pediatric, adult and obstetric patient simulators. The patient simulators include: Ares, Apollo, Juno, Lucina, Aria and Luna.
Nasco Healthcare has a range of patient simulators with a variety of fidelity options available within their range. Nasco Healthcare’s patient simulators have useability in hospital clinical care to casualty and rescue based scenarios. Nasco’s patient simulators prepare the healthcare workforce to be prepared to deliver clinical care required to improve patient outcomes and save lives. Nasco Healthcare has a wide variety of upgradeable patient simulator products from low to high fidelity which means clients can find the right training solution for current and future clinical simulation needs. Nasco patient simulators include: Child CRiSis, Rescue Randy, Alex, Dani, Neonatal Simulators and Teri.
