The iStan Medical Mannequin: it Sweats, Bleeds, and Breathes.

There's an appeal to learning medicine on virtual patient simulators, like Simantha, a simulator for cardiologists that I wrote about last week. You can practice dealing with emergencies and challenging patient situations that you might rarely encounter in practice. You can learn from your mistakes. You can be tested in a standardized fashion with actual clinical situations. And you can learn about pathophysiology and the effects of medications without the need for laboratory animals or actual patients.

The excellent blog, Clinical Cases and Images, brought a new patient simulation to our attention -- the "iStan" medical mannequin. iStan is a "wireless, sweating, breathing, bleeding training mannequin," according to Chris Seper of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. A video of iStan is below:

Live from ShowCASE: iStan

iStan is completely wireless. Procedures that can be performed on iStan include defibrillation, chest tube, catheterization, and needle decompression. He can also "drool, cry, and bleed out of his ears."

iStan was originally designed for use by the U.S. Army. For more information on iStan, as well as interviews with the engineers who created it, see the METI website.

Designed from the inside out, METI has created the first patient simulator truly based around a human-like skeletal structure. A revolutionary development in itself. But iStan also closely mimics the anatomical workings of the human body to a level of realism not possible with other simulators. Spine, neck, arms and hips all move with incredible life-like accuracy. And iStan is fully wireless and battery operated for amazing portability and versatility. Modeled from a unique cast of a real person, the skin of iStan truly acts, looks and feels like real human skin. Finally, iStan comes fully loaded, boasting an unsurpassed array of new, breakthrough features that will take simulation training to a new and exciting level of realism.

Labels: Cleveland Plain Dealer, iStan, Simulation

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