USC Union’s Nursing Simulation Lab gives future nurses complete hands-on medical training. Their state-of-the-art technology replicates real-life situations and procedures right here on campus. Come take a tour and see how our nurses learn their skills.
Our Sim Lab is home to a number of mannequins that stand-in for real life patients. High fidelity mannequins, two adults and a child, can replicate real medical emergencies like seizures and can “speak” to students via a control panel. Professors can create scenarios and verbally list symptoms to test student skills. The medium fidelity mannequins – a mother and infant – can simulate the process of childbirth when operated by professors. Four low fidelity mannequins help students test their skills with tracheotomies, NG tubs, catheters, and moving patients.
Other technologies include a MATT (MedVision Auscultation Task Trainer). This simulator is a tool for learning auscultation points and sounds. It produces heart sounds, lung sounds, and abdomen sounds so that nursing students can listen with stethoscopes and learn to make diagnoses based on what they hear.
The department also has an Alaris system, which consists of the central core, pump module, and syringe module. These are used for adult, pediatric, and neonatal care in hospitals and healthcare facilities. It delivers fluids, medications, or blood and blood products to patients at the correct dosage rate. For skills like staging wounds, giving injections, and inserting NG tubes, the lab has wound kits, injection pads, and NG tube training models.
“These items were obtained through grants and partnerships with the C.H & Anna E. Lutz Foundation in Chester, the Chester Healthcare Foundation, Blue Cross Blue Sheild, and Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System,” said Lynn Edwards, Nurse Administrator. “These simulators help students practice essential skills without risking harm to live patients.”
NG Tube Trainer
For the past three years, students graduating from USC Aiken’s School of Nursing at Union have received a 100% pass rate on the NCLEX (Nursing Licensure Exam) and have gone on to find jobs at hospitals in Union and surrounding communities.
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