Abstract

As simulation emerges as the best practice in education; access to its offered trainings still remains a challenge. The James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital and Clinics serves over 94,000 unique Veteran and active duty patients in more than 1.2 million outpatient visits at its main hospital, Primary Care Annex, Outpatient Clinic and three community based outpatient Clinics (CBOCs) spread out over more than two dozen offsite locations.

Currently more than 260 nursing and medical staff work at locations other than the main hospital campus. It is often difficult, if not impossible, to schedule staff training at the main hospital for those who work at offsite locations due to staffing priorities and travel time. Thus, staff working offsite do not get the same opportunity to attend educational classes as those working in the main hospital. As a result, the James A. Haley VA Hospital (JAHVH) simulation faculty teamed up with the JAHVH Disaster Emergency Management program (DEMPS) team leader to use one of the larger Dual Use Vehicle (DUV) buses they had on campus to bring education, including disaster emergency management preparedness trainings to the outlying clinics. The VA Sim Bus has also formed a strategic partnership with local college and universities to provide disaster management training to provide trainings in natural and chemical disasters that may occur in our area. This session will provide the blueprint on the bus features and usage, challenges and successes and how we maintain its operational capacity for ongoing various simulation trainings.

Author Details

Carol Wilson, DNP, MBA/TM, MSN, CCRN, CEN; Janet Sprehe, DNP, APN-BC, CVRN, RN-BC; Carla Brunk, MSN, ED, RN, CEN

Sigma Membership

Non-member

Type

Presentation

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

N/A

Research Approach

N/A

Keywords:

Simulation, Disaster Preparedness, Disaster Training, Simulation Bus, Rural

Conference Name

INACSL Conference

Conference Host

International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning (INACSL)

Conference Location

Washington, D.C., USA

Conference Year

2017

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

Abstract Review Only: Reviewed by Event Host

Acquisition

Proxy-submission

Share

COinS
 

SimBus Innovations: Taking disaster preparedness simulations to the outlying areas

Washington, D.C., USA

As simulation emerges as the best practice in education; access to its offered trainings still remains a challenge. The James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital and Clinics serves over 94,000 unique Veteran and active duty patients in more than 1.2 million outpatient visits at its main hospital, Primary Care Annex, Outpatient Clinic and three community based outpatient Clinics (CBOCs) spread out over more than two dozen offsite locations.

Currently more than 260 nursing and medical staff work at locations other than the main hospital campus. It is often difficult, if not impossible, to schedule staff training at the main hospital for those who work at offsite locations due to staffing priorities and travel time. Thus, staff working offsite do not get the same opportunity to attend educational classes as those working in the main hospital. As a result, the James A. Haley VA Hospital (JAHVH) simulation faculty teamed up with the JAHVH Disaster Emergency Management program (DEMPS) team leader to use one of the larger Dual Use Vehicle (DUV) buses they had on campus to bring education, including disaster emergency management preparedness trainings to the outlying clinics. The VA Sim Bus has also formed a strategic partnership with local college and universities to provide disaster management training to provide trainings in natural and chemical disasters that may occur in our area. This session will provide the blueprint on the bus features and usage, challenges and successes and how we maintain its operational capacity for ongoing various simulation trainings.