Creating a functioning, respected healthcare simulation program can be a daunting task. Technology is an increasingly important part of healthcare education, but when planning a simulation lab, you’re doing more than just outfitting a building with cameras and manikins—you’re planning to meet quality, compliance, and educational standards for years to come. A successful healthcare simulation lab will require complex technologies that must be expertly integrated. Fortunately, the right technology partner can ease the burden and help you strategize for success.

Treating a gasping patient who’s reported severe shortness of breath or a postpartum mother who’s hemorrhaging can overwhelm a nursing student. Fortunately, simulated scenarios take the risk out of practicing in such emergencies. Unfortunately, not all nurse educators are trained to plan and implement these simulations to the same standards. Scenarios that are too advanced or not properly planned can go wrong for students by creating panic, triggering post-traumatic stress disorder, and even causing them to change their majors. Simulation is a powerful tool in healthcare education, but without education standards, too many students won’t get the most out of these experiences. If the educators who run the simulation labs aren’t trained to uphold a certain standard, lab experience may harm students by giving them a subpar education or a negative experience with the field.

Today’s companies are all about the flow of information from colleague to colleague and team to team. So when work at your organization gets stuck, lost, or forgotten, where does it usually come to a grinding halt? In email? On team collaboration boards? During meetings? If you find that work often stops until the next meeting or until a key team member gets back into town, there are faster, more efficient ways to keep work moving. One of those ways is to get on a video conference call right now.

Many simulationists share a common issue when it comes to day-to-day operations in a simulation. The reality is, many simulation programs are understaffed, and most faculty already have more hats than they can comfortably wear.  This has many programs looking closer at the evolving simulation operation specialist role.  But where does one find someone with the skills needed without sacrificing an educator position? The shortage of nursing educators is a well-known concern; but too often the operations specialist role(s) merely become a strategy to fund another nursing educator.

Is video conferencing at your organization up in the air and all over the place? Maybe some employees love to hop on impromptu video calls with just about anyone from anywhere—even when they’re just down the hall. On the other hand, some resist turning on the camera or using video conferencing at all. You may see different departments favoring different solutions. If there is no consistent user experience and video conferencing has become a big hassle for your IT department, you’ll want to make some changes. You know you want to provide an easy, standardized experience in your meeting rooms, small or large. But what do you do when executives don’t make video conferencing a priority, don’t understand the benefits, and don’t want to set aside budget to solve your organizations collaboration issues? Start by gathering user and stakeholder feedback, researching and narrowing down your options, and then presenting the information to those who will make the final decision. State your case by beginning with the “why” behind the push for video conferencing.

Just as medicine continues to advance, healthcare simulation—and the standards that govern it—are also evolving. It’s important that healthcare organizations keep up, but how do you know when and what parts of your simulation technology should be upgraded?

Video collaboration in the workplace is more the rule than the exception. For example, 55 percent of organizations use Skype For Business—but not every tool out there will be the right fit for your particular needs and business case. Here are some best practices; to help you pick the right video collaboration tool and get the most out of it.

Building out a space for a healthcare simulation center involves much more than just finding a space and the technology to put into it. How will the technology work in the space to optimize workflows? How do you ensure the use of space and technology will be intuitive and user friendly? There are at least 430 simulation centers in the U.S., but only a fraction of those are accredited. One reason for that may be that there are a lot of needs, standards, and best practices that are overlooked, so it’s important to make sure you know what to consider from the planning phase.