Comments on: Ingenious use of tech: Training Med Students in Second Life (virtual) Hospitals

By: Medical Assistant

Medical Assistant — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 04:57:43 +0000

This is an interesting post. Believe it or not we had a similar program for my paramedic school I attended last year. The RN school had the same thing, except they had 4 dummies to our one. the mannequins really are quite phenomenal. They breath, chest rise and fall, you can intubate them, decompress them (chest tubes), start IV lines and everything. It is the closest you can come to a human for I believe a price tag of about 50-75k. To be honest the mannequin mostly comes in handy when practicing airway maintenance and assessment. Personally I think these kind of tools are very important, people in the medical community need to practice as much as possible before they actually get to work on patients. Real life patients are truly a whole different story and these simulators bring you pretty close to the real thing. Not to mention Docs often times have absolutely no experience in pt assessment and treatment before they begin their residency, so great tools for them.

By: Raksha

Raksha — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 07:42:43 +0000

What an interesting post! As a pre-med student, this title immediately grabbed my attention. It is amazing to me how far technology has brought us today. My mom (who is also a physician) would have never thought programs like these would be possible to create for the medical field. The greatest thing about it is that it seems to be very beneficial for the students! I went ahead and read the rest of the article because I wanted to know more about the SL program. Although it clearly states that more research must be done, the examples it presents show that the SL program is meeting its goals. The feature I find most fascinating about the simulation program is that it allows social networking. It’s almost like an interactive facebook for medical professionals — that’s what makes it so life-like. You aren’t alone in that simulated OR room, you actually need to interact with other “avatars” and work together just as you would in real life. It is also a wonderful teaching tool because it allows students to interact with physicians all around the world. I’d love to hear more about medical training in the virtual world and about the developments this program will make!

By: Shahid N. Shah

Shahid N. Shah — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:18:33 +0000

Thanks, I appreciate it

By: Robert

Robert — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 00:25:01 +0000

Your blog is very informative! Will come back and visit often.