TSU’s College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences (COPHS) revealed its new Interdisciplinary Health Professions Practice and Simulation Complex to the public Friday, October 23, in the former Nabrit Science Center. The ribbon cutting ceremony and Open House will be held as a part of TSU’s Homecoming 2015.
The first phase of a six year strategic plan to develop a Health Science Center, the Health Professions Practice and Simulation Complex promises to be a new learning environment that transitions and expands learning from the traditional classroom to practice labs. The Complex’s practice labs and classrooms are equipped with cutting-edge audio-visual equipment to facilitate instruction and current healthcare automation and informatics utilized in the most progressive institutions. The new practice labs are designed to teach health professions students in an environment that simulates actual healthcare settings with the goal of developing “practice-ready” health professions graduates.
“The US healthcare industry is very dynamic and currently requires health professionals that are innovative, critical thinkers ready to meet its demand for inter-professional healthcare teams to improve health outcomes of the population,” says COPHS Dean Dr. Ed Stemley. “This new learning environment is an anticipated game changer for COPHS students as they will now be trained beyond the minimum professional licensure and/or certification requirements.”
The Complex also contains a 20,000 square foot Interdisciplinary Health Professions Simulation Center. The simulation center will provide a simulated hospital and clinic environment to evaluate the ability of health professions students to work collaboratively to care for patients as taught in the practice labs and classrooms. This simulation center is very innovative as it goes beyond simulated hospital and clinic rooms that are traditionally offered by health profession academic institutions to also include all of the major operational units (e.g. nursing unit, pharmacy, respiratory therapy department, clinical lab, medical records department, etc.) that are typically found in healthcare institutions to support the care provided in the hospital and clinic patient room. The simulation center will include affiliations with area medical and nursing schools in addition to the six health disciplines offered by the College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.
The entire TSU community including all COPHS alumni, students, affiliate hospital and clinic representatives, preceptors, industry partners and area health professions community college and high school representatives were invited to attend.