The future’s bright for nursing students with new, ultra-modern facilities

Date 5.10.2018

Nursing students will be better trained and prepared for work placements and future careers thanks to new, state-of-the-art training facilities.

After a team effort to acquire the equipment and a bespoke VR scenario they were officially unveiled by Vice Chancellor Professor Nick Petford in the new nursing suite at Waterside campus*.

The VR and mannequins allow students to ‘treat’ people in a variety of nursing settings without ever leaving the University, giving them ‘as close to real-life as possible’ training.

They can also be used to simulate challenging scenarios in the home and community.

image photo gemma langley nursing vr goggles

Child Nursing student Gemma Langley (left) was one of the students who test-drove the new VR system.

The fully interactive VR system includes actual conversations with the characters in the scenario and gives clinical feedback that is matched to the student’s learning objectives and allows lecturers to monitor their progress.

The experience is so life-like that when Senior Lecturer in Practice Development Andy Winter’s VR-self took a ‘fall’ during a test run, he nearly fell in real-life – a clear demonstration of how immersive the system is.

The mannequins are used for simulation training, in which nursing students learn and practice the skills they will use in real-life, such as performing chest compressions if a patient has had a heart attack.

There are five in total – an adult female, adult male, an older boy, young girl and a baby – offering a more life-like look and feel than the existing mannequins, increasing the quality of the training.

Professor Petford himself played the part of a nursing student, donning a Bluetooth stethoscope which allows the wearer to ‘hear’ a variety of medical issues.

image photo nursing nick petford james fawdon

Vice Chancellor Nick Petford uses a Bluetooth stethoscope to examine one of the mannequins supervised by James Fawdon, Senior Lecturer in Adult Nursing.

The mannequins can also be ‘hooked up’ to life-saving equipment, such as ECG (heart rate) monitors, increasing the reality of the ‘on the ward’ experience.

They will be used by Adult, Child, Learning Disability and Mental Health nursing students but the new facilities will be available to other health students, such as Paramedic Science as well as health professionals who are already qualified and want to top-up or extend their advanced clinic skills.

image photo donna bray nursing baby mannequin

Donna Bray, Subject Lead for Nursing, with the baby mannequin.

Donna Bray, Subject Lead for Nursing at University of Northampton, said: “Our new mannequins might appear a little too life-like for some, but this is the very reason we wanted them. We are lucky to have lecturing staff who are combining their clinical knowledge with technical expertise to replicate the complex challenges nurses face in clinical practice.

“We are moving toward ‘hyper-real’ training here at the University of Northampton, so it’s important to state that nursing students need facilities like this. The more life-like they are, the more they engage with their training, preparing them for the reality of life on the wards.

“Coupled with Virtual Reality, we can deliver the most realistic simulation training nursing students can possibly experience.”

Gemma Langley was one of the Child Nursing students who tried their hand at VR: “Everything looks and sounds as if you are actually there. I really liked using it and it will be great for students wanting experience of clinical management.”

Find out more about nursing courses at University of Northampton.

*The idea to purchase the new facilities came about after Gail Reoch, Senior Lecturer in Child Nursing, attended The International Paediatric Simulation Society Symposium hosted in Amsterdam, Gail Reoch (Senior Lecturer in Child Nursing) and realised how essential they would be for University of Northampton’s Nursing’s Simulation ideas.