UK College of Nursing’s new skills lab offers students greater hands-on learning opportunities
A new, larger skills lab is helping the University of Kentucky’s College of Nursing more effectively train future nurses in the patient-centered skills key to their profession.
The state-of-the-art Clinical Simulation and Learning Center Skills Lab — located in UK’s Multi-Disciplinary Science (MDS) Building — started hosting nursing classes for the first time this past semester.
“This has been a game changer, particularly for our skills lab folks,” said Stephanie Kehler, Ph.D., the director of the Clinical Simulation and Learning Center. “They were in one lab space previously and running out of room. They have more space here and new, updated equipment so they’re very excited.”
The lab is the latest example of how UK’s College of Nursing is serving the state’s needs by educating the next generation of Kentucky nurses. Facing a state- and nationwide nursing shortage, the new lab helps the college fulfill its mandate in training the nurse of the future.
Unlike many other nursing programs across the country, UK has faculty dedicated specifically to simulation and lab work so that students are best prepared before they work with real patients.
The lab features two large rooms, lined with beds where students can practice skills on low-fidelity mannequins. More in-depth skills education can occur in another separate room that functions as a simulated ICU with a new high-fidelity mannequin — one that can talk and react like a real patient.
“It’s beautiful. I love it,” said Suzie Pilon, D.N.P., a senior lecturer in the College of Nursing who has been teaching nursing skills courses in the new lab this semester. “This has so much more room and it’s so much more conducive to teaching skills. The space really supports it.”
A full year of Pilon’s courses includes education in key skills like infection prevention, wound care and injections. Previous to the new simulation lab’s opening, Pilon taught nursing skills in a much smaller, more dated space where the number of students using the lab at the same time was often more than 30 — too many, Pilon said.
In the much larger Clinical Simulation and Learning Center Skills Lab, more students can be taught at once but in smaller groups. Two separate classes of 20 students each can use the lab at the same time.
“We have smaller groups here — much more conducive to learning, especially skills,” Pilon said. “When you only have around 20 students, we can answer questions and it’s a lot easier to reinforce good habits and proper learning.”
Because of the improved student-to-instructor ratio, Pilon and her student interns — which function as peer tutors for those who haven’t taken the skills course before — can offer students more direct, hands-on help.
“In the older space when had 30 students, we weren’t able to get that much feedback,” said Jessica Borzanky, a junior nursing student and intern who assisted Pilon this semester. “In here you’re able to give way more feedback because the student-to-teacher ratio is way smaller.”
Both Borzanky and fellow junior nursing major Oakley Curd took their first skills classes in the old space and then have assisted Pilon as interns this past semester in the new skills lab.
“I think it does improve our education,” Curd said. “It’s a beautiful space and it allows new opportunities.”
While the new Clinical Simulation and Learning Center Skills Lab is an increase in space, it’s also great jump start for the increased space coming in the currently under-construction Michael D. Rankin MD Health Education Building — where six more lab spaces and six more simulation rooms will be available to the College of Nursing.
“That will allow us to grow as student growth happens,” Kehler said. “Hopefully it will be a place that students will want to come and want to practice. It’s a lot easier to do that when you have new, updated equipment, a beautiful space and have the faculty around to support you.”
As the state’s flagship, land-grant institution, the University of Kentucky exists to advance the Commonwealth. We do that by preparing the next generation of leaders — placing students at the heart of everything we do — and transforming the lives of Kentuckians through education, research and creative work, service and health care. We pride ourselves on being a catalyst for breakthroughs and a force for healing, a place where ingenuity unfolds. It's all made possible by our people — visionaries, disruptors and pioneers — who make up 200 academic programs, a $476.5 million research and development enterprise and a world-class medical center, all on one campus.
This story was originally published on UKNow.
