The Diane Ramy Faulconer STAR Centers at Modesto Maidique Campus (MMC) and Biscayne Bay Campus (BBC) provide students and healthcare providers with the opportunity to learn through interdisciplinary teamwork and discipline-specific care of simulated multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, and multi-generational patients in a safe environment – prior to providing care in real-world clinical situations. The generous support of Diane Ramy Faulconer ’74 will expand the mission of the STAR Centers to advance local, regional, and global healthcare by providing an innovative learning environment where simulation technology facilitates inter-professional healthcare education, collaboration, research, and evidence-based practice.
The Diane Ramy Faulconer Endowments will distinguish the STAR Centers as leading national and international centers of excellence for teaching and research and fulfill the College’s 21st century vision for interdisciplinary “High Touch-High Tech” education.
The STAR Centers feature patient rooms that replicate multiple acute care patient care settings, and clinical exam rooms, which are equipped with high-fidelity human patient simulators and state-of-the-art healthcare equipment. Simulation scenarios replicate real-world patient encounters for teaching clinical decision making, critical thinking, and communication skills with patients, families and teams of health professionals.
The STAR Centers are fully accredited in teaching/education by the Society for Simulation in Healthcare Accreditation and are officially designated as an American Heart Association Heart Saver facility with multiple course offerings.
A Virtually Immersive Learning Experience to Prepare You for the Real World
Main STAR Center - 3rd Floor, AHC 3 Building – Modesto A. Maidique Campus
Simulation teaching is providing our students with an unprecedented, hands-on learning experience. This is most evident when you enter through the doors of the 20,000 square-foot Diane Ramy Faulconer Simulation Teaching and Research Center – aka STAR Center – at the Nicole Wertheim College of Nursing & Health Sciences.
You’ll think you’ve just walked into a fully operational clinic and hospital. From a prep-scrubbing station, to a 15-bed critical care unit, primary care clinic offices to operating rooms equipped with surgical instruments, the STAR Center gives students the real-world acute and primary healthcare experience without having to leave campus. Our multimodal simulation rooms replicate settings that include:
- Medical-surgical
- Critical/emergency care
- Obstetrics
- Pediatrics
- Clinic examinations
- Patient/family home settings
The Jorge and Darlene Perez Clinical Skills Lab is equipped with Laerdal SimMan® patient simulators, leading-edge healthcare equipment and task-trainers to help you build the hands-on skills needed to thrive in future practice performing:
- Vital signs
- Catheterizations
- Nasogastric and tracheostomy insertions and care
- Injections
- Wound care
- Head-to-toe health and environmental assessments
You’ll have access to “high-maintenance” patients through high-fidelity patient simulators such as Gaumard Scientific’s “Victoria” – the most advanced, life-like childbirth simulator–and Gaumard Scientific's "Family of Five" – mother, father, two children and newborn. Don’t be surprised if you’re asked to:
- Deliver a baby
- Answer a code blue to resuscitate a cardiac patient
- Intubate a child suffering from an asthma attack
- Assist with laparoscopic surgeries
And all using genuine equipment complemented by state-of-the-art simulation education technology.
Part practice, part instruction, the STAR Center features three control rooms for operating computerized patient care scenarios and monitoring your progress through video capture. After finishing simulation clinical work, you’ll meet with your instructors and other students in one of three debriefing rooms to review, evaluate and discuss outcomes of the day's simulations.
