Pitt State's regional Health Simulation Center to open

After receiving nearly a million dollars earlier this year to develop a regional health simulation laboratory for Southeast Kansas, the Pittsburg State University Department of Nursing is officially opening the doors of the new Health Simulation Center.

Following months of renovations and additions, the department will host a grand opening and ribbon cutting ceremony at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 26, at the new center in McPherson Hall. Mr. Reggie Robinson from the Kansas Board of Regents, representatives from the Kansas State Board of Nursing, Kansas Senator Jim Barone, and members of the PSU Nursing Advisory Board, Pittsburg Area Chamber of Commerce, and PSU faculty, staff and students will all be in attendance.

The regional center is designed around the addition of three new health simulators purchased by the department earlier this year. The simulators – an adult, a child, and a baby that look and act like humans – can each be programmed to experience realistic health ailments. The simulators provide nursing students with valuable practice tending to “patients” before they go to work in an actual hospital setting.

The first to provide technology like this in the Southeast Kansas area, the Health Simulation Center will benefit more than PSU students. Thanks to a $504,000 Nursing Initiative grant by the State of Kansas and the Kansas Board of Regents, the facility is a learning center for health professionals, area school districts, and community colleges. The university has also provided more than $340,000 for the center.

“We were honored to be the recipient of the largest amount of funding in Kansas from this grant,” said Dr. Mary Carol Pomatto, chairwoman of the Department of Nursing at PSU. “The ability to serve the educational and healthcare needs of Kansans is greatly enhanced by the Health Simulation Center. This is a celebration of the efforts of a large team who made this happen for students and for the region.”

For more information on the PSU Health Simulation Center or on the grand opening ceremony, contact the Department of Nursing at 620-235-4431.

---Pitt State---