During this episode, Kathy Sokol and Deb discuss simulation. Kathy has nearly 20 years of simulation experience and a lot to share with our listeners. Kathy brings clear insights to age old problems in nursing education.

Kathy Sokol is a dedicated nursing educator and expert in medical simulation who has made significant contributions to the field of healthcare education. She is committed to promoting excellence in nursing education and providing her students with the knowledge and skill they need to succeed. 

Kathy has extensive experience in healthcare education and medical simulation. 

She has worked in various healthcare settings, including hospitals, clinics, and educational institutions, and has a passion for teaching and mentoring nursing students. 

Kathy is an expert in medical simulation and has written extensively on this topic, sharing her knowledge and insight with other educators and healthcare professionals. 

This episode is sponsored by Beaker Health  
https://beakerhealth.com

Kathy Sokol's email- Sokolk2gmail.com

Innovative SimSolutions.
Your turnkey solution provider for medical simulation programs, sim centers & faculty design.

Transcript

Disclaimer: 0:00

The views and opinions expressed in this program are those of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or positions of anyone at Innovative Sim Solutions or our sponsors.

Beaker Health Ad: 0:13

This week's episode is sponsored by Beaker Health, the community platform that crowdsources and monetizes your proficiencies for continuing education. With Beaker Health, you can collaborate with other professionals within your specialty, share your expertise, and receive just in time knowledge. Join a community of healthcare professionals who are passionate about improving patient care and advancing their careers. With Beaker Health, you'll have access to personalized dashboards, certificates, and feedback loops that give you the tools to succeed. Try it today at Beakerhealth.com and experience the power of community engagement in healthcare education.

Intro: 0:52

Welcome to The Sim Cafe, a podcast produced by the team at Innovative Sim Solutions, edited by Shelly Houser. Join our host, Deb Tauber and co-host Jared Jeffries as they sit down with subject matter experts from across the globe to reimagine clinical education and the use of simulation. So pour yourself a cup of relaxation, sit back, tune in, and learn something new from The Sim Cafe.

Deb: 1:33

Welcome to another episode of The Sim Cafe, and today I'm really honored and thrilled to have my dear friend Kathy Sokol. Kathy and I worked together at a school for a while, and um, it's just an honor and a pleasure to interview this Simulationist. Kathy , welcome to The Sim Cafe. And why don't you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself.

Kathy: 1:57

Thank you. I'm very happy to be here. I've been doing simulation probably for about 18 years. I started out as a faculty facilitator and from there I went to setting up my own lab and starting programs in a school in Florida. And then I also wrote scenarios and that led me to take on an operations position with a large university where I helped set up new simulation labs and manage some campuses, training their faculty and lab specialists. And I have just always enjoyed simulation. It's always fascinating me. I can't believe what's, how it's changed since I first started doing it.

Deb: 2:40

That is for sure. In 18 years you've seen a lot of changes. You are really a pioneer. A pioneer in simulation. I know. I haven't been doing it for, for 18 years. And I think one thing that I've always loved about Kathy is that she always will give you the feedback you wanna hear, actually, not that you wanna hear, but direct feedback. So I expect some honest answers here today.

Kathy: 3:06

<laugh> ? Yep .

Deb: 3:07

Okay. Why don't you share with our listeners a little bit about, a little bit more about yourself and how you see the field as having changed and how you got into simulation. Because if you got into it 18 years ago, there was something that led you into that journey.

Kathy: 3:23

Well, I kind of was , uh, volunteered into it initially. All the faculty, I was , um, clinical instructor at the time and the clinical instructors were expected to do simulations with the clinical groups. And that's how I was introduced to it. But I found that I liked it, I enjoyed it. I had no idea what it was until I started doing it. My background was in med-surg telemetry, cardiovascular nursing, I'd done some home health and I decided I wanted to try teaching and I started as a clinical instructor. And from there I ended up getting my master's degree in nursing education and teaching full-time classes. So the whole time I've been teaching , um, I've always integrated simulation at some point at many points throughout my semester because I find that students need the hands on . It isn't enough for them to just sit and listen to lecture and play games in the classroom and that kind of stuff. They really enjoyed getting into the lab and working with the mannequins and working with the equipment and practicing the things that they were learning in the classroom. That's what I found was the , the most fun and the most interesting thing for me.

Deb: 4:37

I would agree. Thank you. Now, Kath , do you have a favorite or most impactful simulation story that you'd like to let our listeners hear about?

Kathy: 4:46

Yes , I do. Um, I have a lot of favorite sims, but my most impactful, and I, I guess maybe I might have been on the ground floor of doing this, I developed a , uh, clinical day sim where we were in the lab for about six hours. I had six students with their faculty and they each had their own mannequin who had different diagnoses. It wasn't all the same diagnoses . And we were able to integrate not only the nursing students into the sim but because the school had a PTA program and a radiology tech program, we were able to integrate their students in some part of the day. So it was a lot of fun. Both the allied health groups loved it. What we did is we had a patient fall on the floor and , uh, because the student went to lunch and didn't tell anyone she was going to lunch, and so I conveniently placed the patient on the floor. When she came back from lunch, she saw the leg sticking out from under the cover , uh, under the curtain and freaked out. And so we went ahead and called the radiology department to come and get our patient. The radiology tech came and put her on a stretcher, actually wheeled her out of the lab and kept her out in the lab for a few minutes and then came back in with their instructor carrying a wet reading of a fractured hip. And so then we called the doctor and got orders for Bucks traction. So I called the P T A department and I said, can you help us set up Bucks traction? And they did. And it really was a extremely realistic and , uh, full of a lot of elements and that's probably the most impactful one that I remember doing.

Deb: 6:37

Excellent. I haven't thought about Bucks traction in a long time. Yeah,

Kathy: 6:41

<laugh> . Yeah .

Deb: 6:43

Yeah . Where do you see the future of simulation going?

Kathy: 6:47

It's kind of scary for me actually. I think there's gonna be a lot of advanced technology a lot more than we have now. More virtual reality, augmented reality. There's a lot of stuff, A lot of talk about AI chat bots. I think there's gonna be, there already are simulators with a far greater ability to interact with students. Um, I saw one recently a demo of one that turns their head and talks to you when you're asking them a question. And I understand there's one that sits up now in the side of the bed. I haven't seen that one, but it's kind of weird. And then also there's talk about developing case scenarios to developing case scenarios like they use in the NCLEX exam, developing cases to help the students prepare for practice. So I guess the idea for that would be students would start at one point and continue to come into the lab every couple of weeks adding to the case, building up on it until it gets to a point where they've completed whatever the nursing care plan, whatever they were planning on doing. And I think that, you know, you can do all of those things with sim , but I also think we're moving a little too fast. I think we might be getting caught up in the technology without, as far as nursing simulation, I can't speak for any other kind of simulation, but I think for nursing simulation, we're getting caught up in the technology and not spending as much time as we should be on the actual benefit to the student and later on to the patient from sim . So it's, it's , uh, both a good thing and a bad thing. I see in the future with sim .

Deb: 8:31

Yeah, I would agree that there's some, there's some hurdles that we are, are being rapidly pushed through.

Kathy: 8:40

Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

Deb: 8:41

Yeah . Yeah. I, last week I was in inexperience. I went on vacation. I went to Punta Conta , Dominican Republic for an all-inclusive resort. And we got an experience and it was an immersion room. And what it was, was we were immersed in, first we were in an airplane, so like flying first class and they brought us champagne and stuff like that. There were passports on the table and then the room changed. We were another place. We were in Italy and then there was , you know, different foods. So I had my first experience in an immersion room. And I know that that's one of the things that is big now in healthcare disease immersion simulations . So I think having an experience to do it with something other than healthcare gave me a taste for it's potential. Cause this can expeditiously change the environment to be something else. So I think we'll have to be thinking about how we're gonna put our immersive rooms into simulation spaces in the future as other things.

Kathy: 9:47

Yeah. Because I find, I'm also looking at students' responses to their sim that they've done, because I hear a lot of, especially newbies, fundamental students, freshman students, they are always overwhelmed by it. You know, I wish we had known more, we'd been better prepared. They told us more. Well, the whole idea behind sim is that you don't know that much and we're seeing what you learn . And then I hear at the end of the spectrum, that was fun. I'd like to do that. It's more fun, fun, fun, fun. And I wonder that maybe the students aren't getting all they can get out of it because it's so much fun. You know what I'm saying? It's a really good point. N o, that's a very good point that, you know what, and I think there'd be, obviously if, if S usie was on this, uh, < laugh> i n this interview, s he'd s ay, well, t hat's s ome, someone needs to do research on that <laugh>. Y eah. U m, < laugh>. But I think you're, you're right. Like how, you know, what is the fun factor and what i s that translate into actual outcomes mm-hmm. <affirmative> for how much w e cognitive, And don't get me wrong, I think learning should be enjoyable. I think you should want to learn, you should enjoy learning, but it doesn't have to be entertainment. We have the term i n education edutainment, and I'd hate to see simulation become that because it's, like you said, the potential for it is so much more. And I think we're still learning all that can be done. Then you have the problem of training the people that are going to be facilitating these new, uh, platforms for simulation. They become more and more complex. So the facilitators can't just know about the disease process that's being talked about or being practiced. They also have to know all about the technology. And I'm not sure we giving everybody everything they need before they are expected to facilitate these types of scenarios.

Deb: 11:44

No. Their cognitive overload is real. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I remember thinking about the new, you know, the new nurses, when we're giving them all this information, it just feels like we're just pouring a , a bucket of cold water on them . Yes . And just trying to have 'em , you know, drink it without drowning.

Kathy: 12:03

Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. That's right. I see that every time when I am teaching. Of course, curriculum has to be intense, especially in undergraduate pre-licensure program. It's a little different than the hospital diploma programs and the A D N programs, they cover the same information, but the pre-licensure B S N is just more in depth . And I think students just get, like you said, they're drowning in this. And I'd like to see simulation take some of that stuff off of their plate in a different way. You know, you can learn about a disease process. I, I did this one time. We wanted to have the seniors do a project, it was an associate degree program. They were doing a project and they wanted to use sim. The, the instructor said, how can we use SIM to have them do this project? So we decided on four cases that we felt they would see in practice quite a bit. One was pulmonary edema, another was , uh, cardiogenic shock. And I don't remember what the other two were, but they were things that we were seeing in our area, in our region in Florida quite a bit. And the nurses needed to be prepared to care for these patients. So what we did is we designed teams, we selected teams of the senior nursing students and they worked up a simulation. Now this was a little different than your usual simulation because normally the student doesn't know what's gonna happen. But these students had to know what was gonna happen because what they did is present it to the rest of their class. It was recorded and they presented it live to their class. And the class was able to answer questions and whatever. And we divided it up. One of the students did all the patho research. Another one did all the diagnostic testing research, another one did all the nursing intervention research. I think one did the medication research on all the meds that you would give a person with the situation and all the side effects and all that kinda stuff. And then we did the scenario, we stopped the scenario midway before the crisis happened. And one of the students said, the patient is such and such, they're declining, the blood pressure's falling, whatever it is . So we're going to call the doctor . So then we'd start the scenario up again. The person would be on the line, the patient would be crashing, burning, and they would be addressing the situation. They obviously didn't kill anybody. The patient survived. We stopped the sim and then they opened it up for discussion. They had questions that they were asking the classmates. Now I guarantee you that the students that were involved in those sims, let's say it's a pulmonary edema, SIM could probably adequately care even as a new grad for a pulmonary edema patient. And that's what I would like to see simulation doing in curricula rather than just using it as, you know , clinical, clinical hours, whatever they do, I'd like to see it serve a very practical purpose. And I think it can, it just takes some planning .

Deb: 15:10

I like that. I like that. And, but I think you go to, to the point that you mentioned earlier, faculty are overloaded. They're overwhelmed learning the technology, it takes a , you know, it takes, it takes a village.

Kathy: 15:23

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

Deb: 15:25

Yeah. Now, do you have any lessons that you learned during the pandemic that you wanna share with our listeners? Anything that was, what was Kathy Sokol doing during the pandemic?

Kathy: 15:37

Well, I was on a Friday afternoon. I was told that Monday morning we would go online and I had never taught online. None of us, most of us had not . And uh, since I was teaching fundamental skills, they said, stop by the lab and we're gonna give you some stuff to take home cuz you're gonna have to do some demo tapes. <laugh>. So I got to the lab and I have a small car. I drive Nissan Versa . And they're bringing out these big casket sized containers, <laugh> full of mannequins and supplies and equipment. And I'm, you know, I'm , I'm moving stuff around in my car and I'm loading them up. I get home and I, I ask my husband, can you help me unload the car? I says, well what's in the car? <laugh> <laugh> . And yeah, he gets out to the car and he sees all this stuff and my house, my first floor of my house was filled with mannequins and trainers and all kinds of stuff. So that was one thing. It was fun. I enjoyed it. I got to do the training videos. But I also learned that because we were doing our simulation online, the students were not getting the skills because we were using virtual sims. And at the time, those virtual sims, it was about three years ago. Those virtual sims were very complicated. I don't wanna mention any brand names, but if you're familiar with any event , virtual sim programs, they're quite complex. They go on and on for, you know, screen after screen after screen and the students are supposed to click on this and answer these questions, click on that, answer these questions. And the students were getting overwhelmed. They really weren't learning anything. They were too busy trying to get the pages finished and turn in the reports. So after finding that out, I decided to use these virtual simulations , uh, as a guided virtual sim . And I would come on with all of them and we would do it together and they would have the opportunity to ask the questions they wanted and we'd throw it out to the class and say, you know, do you think that's a good question. Is there any other questions? And we worked through the whole thing as a group and I think they got a lot more out of that than the ones that were trying to do it by themselves. So that was the one thing I learned. And you know, also I found out that when the students were at home doing their own lab videos, cuz they had to do their checkoff lab videos, they did a much better job and were much better prepared because they wouldn't turn 'em in until they were perfect. So they'd keep recording and recording and recording. And I've seen this before in another school we had them record their stuff and they'd be in the lab working every single day taping and taping and taping and then uh, erasing it and starting over so that by the time we got it to grade, it was great. And I had the same thing experience , uh, during the pandemic. By the time I got it, it was perfect. But not only that, when the students finally got into clinical, they now knew how to do these skills because they had practiced them so many times. Which is what I think we need to see in sim more is don't do sim, it's not one and done. We have to do the sim once , let the student go out, come back and do it again and see how they improve. And that's another thing we're not doing.

Deb: 18:49

Right. Deliberate practice for master's skills

Kathy: 18:52

Agreed . Needs to be considered. Yep . Yeah.

Deb: 18:55

Yeah. Now do you have an aha moment? Something that as an educator, as a lifelong learner, as someone with a lot of nursing experience?

Kathy: 19:06

Yes. My aha moment since I have been working with sim for so long was over the years I realized that SIM can't take the place of caring for live individuals. There's no way you can do that. I think that programs that think that it's a good supple , you know, substitute for being in the clinical, I think they need to re rethink that because I have seen students that they do a SIM and the next week in clinical they have a patient that is the exact patient they just did in SIM last week and they don't even know where to start. They don't have the first clue . And that really shocked me because in the lab the week before, it looked like they knew what they were doing, but now I'm seeing apparently it didn't get through. So I really think we need to go back to the drawing board about how we're using simulation and nursing education.I really do. And it's probably, you know , I'm an older nurse, obviously I've been around for a while . But I think we need to pull back on the bells and whistles and get down to the meat and potatoes so to speak, of what's going on. Because nurses are practicing in a way different environment than when you and I were first outta school. Right. Things are way different and you're younger than me but I'm , it's still different. But I don't think that the education is keeping up with these things. Like you mentioned earlier, the students are, are just overwhelmed with all this information and they get out, they pass their boards because all they do is study for the boards. Whether they understand what the questions mean or anything. They just remember what they're supposed to say. Then they get out into their first job. And I've seen 'em taking my clinical groups around. I see them all the time. And it's not just in Nevada where I'm at right now. It was in Florida too. You'll see new grads that just don't have a clue. They're just dying out there. They are absolutely overwhelmed. So they don't do anything. And I think simulation can help get rid of that problem. I really do. I think that we can give students more confidence and more of an understanding of what they're gonna have to be doing. Cuz I used to be able, seven or eight years ago, I could watch nursing students , uh, start out as freshmen and really be overwhelmed with everything. And by the time they were ready to graduate, I would be confident in having them take care of me. Right. And I don't see that now and I don't know what's happened in those years. I know that healthcare has changed so much, but I really think we need to take a step back at this point and see what can we do with sim ? We gotta do something different than what we're doing.

Deb: 21:48

Right. Now, Are there any final words that you would like our listeners to remember this conversation b y? D o h ave a couple of words that you wanna leave h er friends with?

Kathy: 21:56

Yeah, I think I've been doing some of my own research about how nurses who have had simulation in school, how they impact their patient care. And what I've learned is we're not really studying. We don't know how it impacts patient care. And I think that as educators, we need to think about how is what we're doing in SIM really impacting patients and what can we do to change it so that it will have a positive impact on patient care. I think that's important. We need to go step beyond just the students now and look at who they're gonna be taken care of so that they can be completely, not completely admit , they'll be prepared to be independent to a certain point once they graduate.

Deb: 22:43

You know , so I I I think what I'm hearing you say is that transition to practice needs to be a little bit stronger.

Kathy: 22:48

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

Deb: 22:50

Yep .

Kathy: 22:51

Absolutely.

Deb: 22:52

I think any of the programs that are using, like if uh , hospital uses a school to help mm-hmm . Prepare them towards the end so that they have a smoother transition over into that organization. Yeah . And with all merging that's going on right now, I think it's, you know, it's a , the perfect storm.

Kathy: 23:12

It is. It's difficult too because you have so many schools vying for those few spots to bring their students. And I also think that could be remedied with a little creative thinking, but I won't go into that now. But there are, there are solutions to these problems, but we just need to start taking a more active role in 'em . We can't just sit back and say, oh, well it'll work itself out. It's not gonna work itself out.

Deb: 23:35

Right. No, I think I had , we had Brian dang a couple months back and he talked about, you know, faculty funding and facility or lack of physical places for training. You know, leading to circumstances where nursing students aren't getting the experiences they should be getting .

Kathy: 23:50

Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . That's right. That's right. And it's, it's a shame because it is the patient after all that does suffer from

Deb: 23:57

This. Right. At the end of the end of the day. Well, Kathy , this has been a wonderful interview and thank you and we appreciate you being on. Thank you for all that you do. If our listeners wanna get ahold of you, if they're interested in any of your simulations or any of your , uh, information that you shared today, where would they , uh, reach out to you? And we can put that in the show notes.

Kathy: 24:17

You can get me , if I can speak, you can contact me at Sokolk2gmail.com.

Deb: 24:26

Okay . And we'll put that in the show notes. And are you on LinkedIn or social media?

Kathy: 24:29

Yes, I am on LinkedIn. You can follow me there and I'm getting ready to launch a newsletter and I will start, you know, making that address available too for the newsletter. So.

Deb: 24:39

All right , well thank you very much and happy simulating.

Kathy: 24:42

Thank you. You too.

Beaker Health tag: 24:45

Thanks to Beaker Health for sponsoring this week's episode, Beaker Health , improving Patient Care through community crowdsourcing Platforms. With Beaker Health, you'll have all the tools you need to succeed.

Outro: 25:06

Thanks for joining us here at The Sim Cafe. We hope you enjoyed. Visit us at www.innovativesimsolutions.com and be sure to hit that like and subscribe button so you never miss an episode. Innovative Sim Solutions is your one stop shop for your simulation needs a turnkey solution. The Sim Cafe, copyright 2023.