The Sim Cafe~
Discussions on innovative ideas for simulation and reimagining the use of simulation in clinical education. We discuss current trends in simulation with amazing guests from across the globe. Sit back, grab your favorite beverage and tune in to The Sim Cafe~
The Sim Cafe~
In this episode the leaders of SimGHOSTS, Jacqueline McBride and Ferooz Sekandapoor share the journey of SimGHOSTS with Deb and Jerrod. How the "Mavericks" got their name and how and what motivates these thought leaders.
This episode features
Innovative SimSolutions.
Your turnkey solution provider for medical simulation programs, sim centers & faculty design.
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.
Inclusive Consulting Ad:This week's episode is sponsored by Inclusive Consulting. Do you include disability education as part of your simulation learning objectives? Are your learners equipped with first person language and have the insight to care for patients with disabilities? Inclusive Consulting can help you write your next simulation, present at a conference, or create a training course, whatever your needs. Connect with us at www.inclusiveconsultingservices .com .
Intro: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 Jerrod 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:Welcome to another episode of The Sim Cafe . And today Jerrodd and I, my co-host are fortunate to have Jacqueline McBride and Ferooz Sekandepoor from SimGHOSTS. And because we had the Is Society for Simulation and Healthcare on a podcast a couple of weeks ago, and we had INASCL just this week. We'd like to learn a little bit more about SimGHOSTS and the mission and, and history of it. So thank you so much for being on. And Jacqueline , why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself to our guests.
Jacqueline:Certainly. My name is Jacqueline McBride . I'm the Executive director of SimGHOSTS and I'm excited to be here. I am fangirling a little bit right now. <laugh>
Ferroz:Great. Thank you. And uh , my name is Ferooz Sekandepoor. I'm the PR current president of SimGHOSTS and I've been with SimGHOSTS for the last 11 years and I'm also working full-time for the University of British Columbia in Canada. And happy to be here.
Jerrod:Well, thank you both for joining and Jacqueline , appreciate the fangirl piece cuz I've been excited to talk to both of you. We've been fortunate enough to talk to so many different simulation groups and organizations through, through our time here on the pod with with Sim Cafe. And I think what you, you and your organization's doing is, is a little different. So I've been privileged enough to, to get to learn a little more on about you. But can we start with what the mission of SimGHOSTS is and what do you do?
Jacqueline:Certainly, I think what I need to mention is our origin story cuz it's very unique. So back in 2011, Lance Bailey, who was uh , director of clinical simulation at a center in Las Vegas, saw that there was a gap in education for simulation technologists and operators. And so he started a event called Got Sim and he's now gone off and and started Healthy Sim and it's growing tremendously. But since that inception of Got Sim within 11 years, we have grown tremendously and do events all over the world.
Jerrod:So with with events all over the world though, how many employees does Sim Ghosts have?
Ferroz:Oh, I, I wanna answer that. So , so as , uh, Jacqueline mentioned that we grown up from US event to internationally and so we have pretty much conquered , uh, every corner of the world. So we have been to Singapore, we have been to Europe, we have been to uk , uh, uh, uh, we've been to Australia, Middle East, Dubai, Saudi Arabia , uh, uh, Lebanon. We collaborated with a lot of other organizations in Argentina, I should say that as well. And we still growing. But all of those work that we have done over the years, SimGHOSTS often had one full-time employee and the rest of the organization is completely volunteers our boards. So we always had one employee and I think at one point we , uh, before Covid we had two. However, we are back to one , uh, one employee and that is Jacqueline McBride .
Jerrod:So Jacqueline , you're the modern day Gangus Cong <laugh>?
Jacqueline:I am . I think when we were incepted back in 2011, the goal was to have a simulation technology and operations association that was run by Syntex and Sim Ops. Mm-hmm <affirmative> . That was really key to have voices heard.
Deb:You guys have been called the Mavericks of the organizations. What do you, what do you think about that?
Ferroz:Well, we're privileged to be called that way because we always pushed the boundaries. We were, we were not scared of some of the challenges that were out there. We had to figure it out ourselves. Mm-hmm <affirmative> a lot of things. Running an organization, a volunteer organization, and serving this dear community and that they are so passionate. There's a lot of things can go wrong. However, we were not as scared of some of those challenges and we went ahead and did it. And uh , the great thing was that we knew that we always have the back , our community, the support communities for some of our missions and initiatives that we have taken over the years, quite bold. Uh, however, we don't have multiple layers in our organization. So our board is, once we an idea comes in, we debate heavily , uh, that idea. And as soon as we know there's a potential for implementing that, we make the decision right away and the next day we are up and we are just executing that idea and we feedback from our communities right away. So that's why we are privileged to be called Maverick of this , uh, <laugh> . We are the Mavericks. Yes.
Jerrod:Yeah. Cuz that , that's also what I've heard with some other, Deb and I have attended some conferences together and it's always like, oh yeah, those SimGHOSTS guys, they're the, and sorry Jacqueline guys is an all-encompassing term here. They're always the innovators and it's always cool to see, you know, but it's probably cuz of this flat lean structure that's like, Hey , do you see an issue? No. Do you see what's the worst thing that could happen? No , let's try it and then we'll just go from there. And I think that's much different than many organizations and , and even in the tech world, like, I mean getting off simulation, but even the technology side, a lot of these organizations are eliminating that middle management so to speak. And they're saying, Hey, let's make decisions quicker. And you guys have always been that, so that's pretty cool to see then . What's on the docket for CI now ? What's your focus on now? Who are your members? What's going on within the organization today?
Ferroz:So the , our organization who are the members of our organization, I think we um , we have a very diverse community of um , members like that. We reach out. So in the past where initially the idea was just to focus only on people that touches the technologies, however, we've grown up out of that now people that are coordinating the simulation center, they're operating the management. So we expanded our contents to even provide the trainings and the education for uh , not only technical people but outside technical people. Like if you , they are a clinician. They joined recently in the role of taking a role of simulation education. So we do have contents for providing to reaching that , those communities as well.
Jerrod:So just to interrupt, so these are like the people that are like the one stop person for the simulation lab. So they would find kind of a home within Sim Ops if it was just a rural area or maybe a developing country or something that says, Hey I I need to have all these templates and information , uh, from,
Jacqueline:Well I think that is so important because we not only have a global audience, a global membership, so you're gonna get all different kind of simulation centers. And so you've got people that have one people, we have organizations or institutions that have dozens of people and I think it's really neat to see and people to learn from each other and they can see people that are just doing it by themselves and how they're doing it. And then they can also see how they can grow their simulation centers by seeing how other simulation centers have grown. So I think that's really key.
Jerrod:Beautiful. You Know?
Deb:I'm curious about how you came up with the name Sim Ghosts. Where did that come from?
Jacqueline:<laugh> I get a lot of questions about SimGHOSTS especially when I'm dealing outside of healthcare simulation. Sim Ghosts actually means or what our actual name of our organization is the Gathering of Healthcare Simulation Technology Specialists or Sims . But that is such a mouthful, which I do say quite a bit. And I asked Lance recently Why Sims ? And he said a couple things. He said, you know, I wanted something that was unique. I wanted something that when you put it in a Google browser, you are only gonna come up with SimGHOSTS <laugh>. It does really fit our organization cuz we are a really fun group. We are a little bit outside of the norm in terms of we believe in having fun. We're very, we believe in learning, but we believe in that learning should be fun.
Ferroz:Yeah. And also I wanna add some things as well too . SimGHOSTS, we are the ghost behind the scenes. So we are the people that make things happen. If you have a very successful simulation sessions or scenarios or a class or a course , uh, often people see the , the surface that, hey , you know what, today was a very successful course or a scenario that we run , uh, from our simulation center. But behind the scene there's people that have made sure all the equipments are happen running or the preventive maintenance are done, the equipments are set up, the AV systems are set up. So the people that runs these simulation people are often not known. And those are the ghosts. But you can interpret this in many ways. But we are that community.
Jerrod:And I just thought of this analogy. You guys are the pit crew for all the F1 or NASCAR drivers <laugh> . You guys make sure everything happens, but someone else is driving it.
Ferroz:Yeah , that's that's fair. Is that fair? Sort of. Yes. Yeah.
Jerrod:I mean cause it is , it does take a , you know, it takes a village to make everything happen. And then of course the students come in and everybody's learning and you
Ferroz:Have the , doesn't matter how great of a program you have, if your simulator is down, you won't be able to do it.
Jacqueline:I have to say the word gather is really important for us and it's really key on who we are because we're all about community. We run by our community and we wake up every morning, think about how we can help the community grow and learn in their healthcare simulation technology operations.
Jerrod:So keep going on that though. When's the next community gathering? What's going on this year? What are your plans?
Jacqueline:Well, we're really excited. We have our annual USA event on August 1st through the 4th in Omaha, Nebraska. And when I say U S A event, I think we're really gonna be looking at rebranding that because it's a really a global event. We have people coming from all over the world. We're really excited about being at U N M C I X L , Davis Global Center. It's 192,000 square feet of healthcare simulation bliss. And they have, you name it, they have it from holographic theaters to eye walls . And we're gonna take advantage of absolutely every bit of that space. So I'm really, really excited about it.
Jerrod:I've never even heard of such things, but I thought the holograms are only at , um, what do you call those arena concerts with Tupac and , uh, <laugh> Beyonce or something coming outta 'em . But uh, of course , uh, we leave it to sim ghost to, to enable something like that. So I love it.
Ferroz:Yeah, they have been a great host and very generous host. We have had 11 years of experience and they're one of really , uh, most generous hosts for us. And, and we are so fortunate to host our event and we look forward, people are , um, coming from around the world to not only come and attend our event, also visit that great center.
Jacqueline:Well I think what's really cool is that last year we were at Baylor University and it was really a homegrown simulation center. So they showed their process of how they've grown and now we're going to a center that was actually built for healthcare simulation. So to see both of those aspects I think is really important and that's what we look for in a host center. And I wanna do a shout out if you're interested in hosting us in the future, please go to our website. We've got a really easy form and we'd love to talk to you .
Ferroz:Yeah. Because that comes under our mission as well because we empower and also support, not individuals only, but also the institutions that they wanted to be highlighted and their , and ,center is being highlighted globally. And so we would be happy to talk to them
Jerrod:And I'd love to actually get a little more into that global piece. So one, just the headaches I, I guess is lack of better word that comes with such a global organization. But how do you connect everybody? What is going on for this situation for organizing these in Singapore, I heard Australia, et cetera . Are these volunteers that are organizing this? Is this something from you Jacqueline ,Ferooz? Or tell me a little bit more about how that gets involved.
Jacqueline:Certainly our big thing is affiliations. It's working with other organizations to run these events. That's really key to us is seeing how people are running simulations in other countries and working with those organizations is really gonna grow healthcare simulation as a whole. So we work with C S A M , we work with all different kind of organizations. I can't name 'em all now, but that's really key to us. And they're all basically run by volunteers.
Jerrod:Wow. There's so many siloed positions where people feel alone or feel like they don't have the ability to kind of reach out and talk to someone. And I feel like this is a way where people can actually connect to say, oh yeah, I, I'm , I'm alone in Northern Finland. And then you know, someone else is similar to someone in Alaska and it's like, oh I thought I was the only one. It's like, no we're not cuz we're an organization that belongs, belongs together. And I think that's what you guys helped provide.
Ferroz:Yeah, so just an example was , uh, the event that we had with Argentina Azo , we went with the Society of Simulation there and we had an event. So some of the audience were not speaking English, however most we had a translator. Most of our contents were translated at the time. So our mission is to reach out as many people as possible and to many, even to find from within our own community presenters and educators that can speak those languages as well.
Jerrod:Gotcha .
Deb:What are you guys most looking forward to the SimGHOSTS conference? It's coming up in just around the corner.
Jacqueline:Well the abstract process was really exciting this year because we got double the abstracts that we usually get. And so yes, it was really exciting to see and such quality abstracts. So that's really exciting. So we've got seven sessions going at one time. In addition, we didn't wanna turn away too much of that great content. So we've added morning sessions on a digital wall <laugh> that's gonna have back-to-back presentations, which is really exciting. We also have some pretty exciting main plenary speakers. We actually have the president of an axle gonna be speaking about equity. We're really excited about that. We have the filmmaker who did to Err is Human, which I'm really excited about that he's doing a new film. And so he is gonna talk about that new film as well. And then we've got the head of Offit Air Force Base, an original maverick who's gonna talk about the similarities with aeronautical simulation and about working as a team. So not specifically healthcare simulation but simulation as a whole, which I think is important to talk about. So I'm really excited about that. At the same time, it's all about fun. So that's one thing that sim goes does very differently. We don't take ourselves too seriously, we take our education seriously, but we have a good time doing it. And so there's a lot of fun stuff planned that I don't wanna talk about. <laugh>
Deb:No , <laugh> .
Ferroz:We always have some surprises into it . So, and and to be honest, we, we really think , uh, pretty much a year into this, every time the minute our event ends, we start thinking and planning for the next one. So we start the next week after we start thinking about how we structure and what could be difference , where we can raise the bar again and for our next event. So that's um, that's the nature of SimGHOSTS being thinking out of the box, coming up with ideas that never been tried and looking into contents that are relevant, innovation and development for the communities, for the knowledge.
Jerrod:I love that. And I think it's just the way you guys bring connections together. Cause I think as most of us experienced through the pandemic, that connection was lost in so many ways. And we've all of course adjusted, adjusted back, et cetera . We don't need to harp on it. But I think that those that come up with the more innovative ways are all the more important in our lifestyles and connections professionally and privately.
Jacqueline:I think what was really cool during pandemic, we started Sims and Sips. So we would get together as a community and talk about what was happening in simulation centers, what's happening in their world. But we didn't wanna lose that connection cuz that's what really makes us who we are. So that was really, really a fun part. Or if something that started during a bad time, that actually was a very positive thing for us. And so the other thing that we do in our events that is really focused on community is we use an event app and we've used it for about six or seven years that has a really big community aspect to it. So they get on the attendees about two weeks or three weeks before they come to an event and they're seeing who's gonna be there, they're talking in advance , they're doing Zoom meetings, there're there's contests, there's photos. So when you get to the conference you feel more comfortable walking in because you've seen or you've talked or you've met someone already. And that's big because, you know, as geeks, which I'm very proud to say I'm a geek and we are a geek community, sometimes there are some shy people and there's sometimes there's extroverts. And so I think it's a nice blending of everyone beforehand seeing and welcoming people before we get to the door. So
Deb:I love that. I have a couple questions. Do you guys know how many different countries members are from?
Ferroz:I don't know of , uh, we need to check into our data, but we had people as far as Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia to Dubai, Australia and New Zealand, France, UK, Antarctica, Yes. Antarctica, exactly. Oh my goodness . So, so it's amazing the number of people. So we realized when I first talked with Lance, when he started SimGHOSTS the founded Sim GHOSTS the next year I met him and I attended one of these. So at that time we talked about it and say if we in United States have the issue , the problem of not having enough content for our field to support, imagine people that are so far away. So this could be a global organization and that's when we start talking about it. And that's when this mission become more than in North America. And so, and sometime I often when people say, although we are Sim's gathering of healthcare, I do sometimes feel that we are global healthcare simulation technology specialists. So we are a global organization and, and, and I call also we are the, among all the other great organization, the smallest organization from a resource perspective, from a staff perspective as a human resources, but with the biggest footprint around the world. So we are very, very proud to say that. And that happened through collaboration. We went to all these places by ourselves. No, we really utilized this . The actual simulation mission is that this collaboration, teamwork , and we have done that through , uh, partnering up with INASCL, CSAM you know , SSH and all the other great organization around the world to this happen and reach out our communities to forest , uh, those location. We have a scholarship that every year that we also provide through the generous donation of Pocket Nurse. And so we have given a scholarship to people as far as utopia. Uh, a few years ago a physician that couldn't even that physician because of the banking system, we couldn't transfer the money however she paid for herself and we still managed to bring her here to get, receive that education. So that's our global mission and we have done that.
Jacqueline:Well far mentions those affiliations was really exciting this year is we signed a memorandum of understanding with SSH, ASPE and in INASCL to host pre-conferences at each other's meetings, which is so key for those one people shops. So they are interested in possibly putting SPS into their system or they're interested in learning more about nursing education. So I think that's really, really key and very exciting for us. Yeah ,
Jerrod:I love that . And I think collaboration just, you know, there's , they grow the pie and I think sim goes some embodies that. It's really being able to say, Hey, at the end of the day what we care about most, are they getting the healthcare they need? And then with that right, the right type of practice and simulation from there. And I think that it's very altruistic and forward thinking of what many people embody within being a part of some ghosts for being able to push that forward. So it's great to see that leadership really Jacqueline you and Ferooz , uh, our body in that as well. It's , it's great to see.
Deb:Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. One thing that I think is interesting that our listeners wouldn't really get from just hearing this episode, but Jacqueline , where are you physically located? Right now
Jacqueline:I'm located in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Deb:Okay. I'm in Lombard, which is very close to Chicago, Illinois. Ferooz where are you?
Ferroz:I am living in the Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada. So I am the international member of sgo . When I said global, I wasn't joking, so I was just like, so I'm the, the board member of Sim GHOSTS that are international. We, oh , by the way, we also have other global councils that are representing sgo , but however, right now I'm in Vancouver, British Columbia, and Canada
Deb:And Jared, where are you?
Jerrod:Yeah, I'm in Copenhagen, Denmark. So we're, we're a little , a little spread of the four of us today, that's for sure.
Deb:Thank you. What about the online classes? I know that you guys have some online courses. Why don't you tell us a little bit about what you have to offer?
Jacqueline:Yeah, sure. So , uh, quite a few years back we realized , you know, we needed a little bit more education than just meeting together. So we developed a member portal, the latest one just a couple years ago. And it's really dynamic and we're really excited about it because it has a member portal itself where people can talk to each other, share photos, share ideas, ask questions, and then we have a learning hub that has about 250 videos of past conferences, workshops, sessions, all of that is free for our members. And then we have eight hour online courses that are very interactive, $50, which is pretty amazing. And once you complete one of those courses, we offer a digital badge, which I think is very unique for our industry and very exciting. And once you do anything in that learning hub, it all goes into a professional development record and that development record can be downloaded for certification or recertification or for performance appraisals just to show your bosses at your continuing your education. So it's a pretty neat and unique system.
Deb:Now are there any discounts for The Sim Cafe?
Jacqueline:Of course, we would love to have the community from Sim Cafe listeners come to our event. We're offering a hundred dollars off of our registration using the promo code all caps - SIMCAFE23.
Deb:Okay. We'll put that in the, in the show notes.
Ferroz:And also , um, we, as a part of that online courses that we mentioned , uh, we are also right now piloting as a new system, Beaker Health , uh, is just also allowing our community to, to empower them as well to upload and create online courses that they, without the need of any specialized software , uh, so that they can go in into Beaker Health and actually, well sim goes platform on Beaker Health I should say , uh, because SimGHOSTS has been now given a special platform that is hosted on Beaker Health so that they can upload and create their presentations. And uh , we are doing that pilot right now and as soon as we are done, we maybe , hopefully down the road use that as a permanent platform for SimGHOSTS and our communities.
Jerrod:We're very excited about that. Thank you for Ferooz and Jac, that was wonderful. It , there's so many caveats that SimGhosts really allows for their members and I think that the incentive to belong to such a, a heartwarming community is a sense of belongingness that I think is, is quite rare . But to this is like what would be some of the few things that you would want our listeners to leave with in regards to listening to this episode?
Jacqueline:What I would love to have as a takeaway is that we are a community. We're a nonprofit . So we wake up every morning thinking about how we could help our members. And for that we have a very nominal fee. We're $75 for annual membership individually or for an institution it's $60 per person. We think that's key. We wanna make sure that it's our resources are available to everyone, that it's just, it's cost effective for people to be a part of our organization. We have unbelievable resources on our website that's free. We have tips and tricks and we have all different kind of templates and I think that's key. We've done a lot of work with our capability framework, which we haven't discussed, wanna learn more, go to our website. That took about 10 years of researching different job descriptions to help kind of standardize job listings and for, for our community as it continues to grow. So I think walking away we're a community that has fun, that is serious about learning and it's all about coming together at the end of the day for patient safety.
Ferroz:Thank you. And also I wanna add as well , we are the organization that we not only think about our community, we are also talking about thinking of our industries as well. So that is our industry is because we are using their technologies. So we are not looking at them more of like an external entities. Basically we are looking if we are knowing their products, if we are successful in utilizing their product. So there's a one phone call, less phone call to their technical support and it's a better representation of their product. So we always felt that we and industry simulation industries are partners to serve the community that we are actually represent. So that's why we wanted to continue with that relationship. Uh, we wanted to highlight we, we have, even in our , our events, we have in the past we had dedicated workshops that individual vendors came in and conducted workshops and allow them to, for the user to ask questions and they brought their engineers to answer some of those and also hear and listen some of the critiques that our community had as well for them as a feedback, as a constructive feedback. So it worked really well in the past and we have a great relationship and we wanted to thank all of those vendors that been with us over the years and they supported. I think SimGHOSTS, if Simghosts is successful today, it's all the credit goes not only to our community, it goes to our industries because they have been with us all these years supporting us every event, event after event. And um , because like I said, we are a nonprofit organization and we are all together to serve the community and ultimately the patients.
Deb:Thank you. Thank you very much. I appreciate the humbleness of actually all three of you on this episode. And , uh, with that, I think unless you have any questions, we'll finish it out .
Ferroz:Thank you. I look forward , uh, to all of our listeners, if you love your syntex , if you have your, I love your operational specialist, please send them to SimGHOSTS. We will make sure we take care of them. We will , we will educate them and we will give them all the tools that they come back and serve your institutions the best way you envision and so make you proud and makes us proud and ultimately all of our community . So thank you and I'll look forward and make sure you get that discount is $ 100 and please , uh, join us. I look forward to see you all at our event in August.
Deb:Thank you and happy simulating
Inclusive Consulting tag:Thanks to Inclusive Consulting for sponsoring this week's episode. Inclusive Consulting for all your inclusive simulation needs.
Outro: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.
