Editor's Note Disrupting traditional education is imperative to improve quality, retention, and safety in OR and SPD environments, said Hank Balch, Founder and President of First Case Media, in a Wednesday morning session at the 2024 OR Manager Conference. Balch described his overall vision for education as ensuring that “the…

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Editor's Note Virtual reality is making training more immersive for nurses at SSM Health St Mary’s Hospital in Janesville, Wisconsin, according to a September 11 article in GazetteXtra. Although a first for St Mary’s, virtual reality has already been adopted by other SSM Health facilities, the outlet reports. Donning googles…

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Editor's Note At last year’s OR Manager Conference, Kelly Kapp, RN, CNOR, CNAMB, clinical education director at SCA Health, discussed the successful development and implementation of the Perioperative 101 (Periop 101) training program for nurses at SCA facilities. The initiative had the goal of mitigating the nursing shortage while improving…

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Editor's Note An August 6 report in MedPage Today details how the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) is pushing to end the practice of using live animals for physiology training. According to the article, some surgical residencies use live animals (usually pigs) as practice patients. In contrast, only 3%…

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Takeaways From mobile phone apps to immersive virtual reality surgery experiences, digital tools make healthcare training more interactive, more engaging, and more fun for everyone from nurses to surgeons. Modern procedures—including minimally invasive techniques and robotic surgery—require 50 to 100 cases for a surgeon to reach a safe proficiency level…

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Editor's Note Successful use of augmented reality in a cardiac ablation procedure holds additional promise for training as well as more advanced OR applications, according to a February 29 report from Stanford Medicine. During ablation, a treatment for heart arrythmias, surgeons typically refer to as many as eight screens depicting…

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From highlighting the need for better preoperative nasal decolonialization to touting the success of personalized pediatric behavioral health interventions, the posters on display at the 2023 OR Manager Conference highlighted the exceptional work of clinicians in 2023. Poster: “Go Virtual with Periop Training 101” In response to the ongoing nursing…

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Editor's Note This study by nurse researchers at UNC Health, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, shows how technology can keep Generation Z nursing students engaged. After receiving student feedback that lecturers for a new nurse residency program could be “boring” and it was “hard to pay attention,” a virtual escape room…

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Editor's Note The National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) on April 3 announced the launch of its updated licensure examination, the Next Generation NCLEX (NGN) Examination, the American Organization for Nursing Leadership (AONL) April 6 reports. The exam was reportedly modified in order to better measure clinical judgment…

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Editor's Note This study by researchers from Harvard Medical School, Boston, finds that college students whose classes were offered entirely online during the COVID-19 pandemic had increased psychological distress, compared with those attending a mix of in-person  and online classes. Of 59,250 full-time undergraduate college students analyzed, 3.5% attended fully…

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