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IMSH- LIVE 2025- Pioneering New Frontiers in Medical Education

• Deb Tauber • Season 3 • Episode 93

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Prepare to be enlightened as we transition to the dynamic world of simulation education with Lou and Kathy from the Association of Standardized Patient Educators (ASPE). Uncover how ASPE is transforming the field by evolving the concept of "standardized patients" to "simulated participants," promoting inclusivity and personalization. With ambitious plans for 2025, including a program accreditation and a collaborative editorial, ASPE is setting a new benchmark for simulation education. Their upcoming conference in Montreal, featuring a Human Simulation Research Forum, highlights their dedication to innovation. Kathy underscores the importance of updated standards and equitable job classification to elevate the simulation profession, showcasing the diverse and growing applications of this educational approach.

What does it take to transform a garage-based startup into a leading force in the medical supply industry? Join us as Dan Micik, founder of Medical Shipment, shares his remarkable journey and the pivotal role his company plays in the healthcare landscape. From exclusive contracts with BD for the Pixis medication management systems that are used in 60% of hospitals to providing innovative educational tools that minimize medication errors in training environments, Dan offers a fascinating glimpse into the business. We also explore the philanthropic side of Medical Shipment with events like their beloved puppy lounge at Naxal, blending business success with community goodwill.

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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. This week's podcast is sponsored by Innovative Sim Solutions. Are you interested in the journey of simulation accreditation? Do you plan to design a new simulation center or expand your existing center? What about taking your program to the next level? Give Deb Tauber from Innovative Sim Solutions a call to support you in all your simulation needs. With years of experience, deb can coach your team to make your simulation dreams become reality. Learn more at wwwinnovativesimsolutionscom or just reach out to Deb Contact today. 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. 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 Tauber:

Welcome to another episode of The Sim Cafe. Today,Jerrod and I are live at IMSH 2025 with Dan Micic. Thank you, Dan, for being on. And why don't y and today, j and I are here live at IMSH 2025 with Dan Micic Thank you, Dan, for being on. And why don't?

Dan Micic:

Yeah, I started the company medical shipment a little over 17 years ago, started out of the garage and over these last 17 years it seems like it's flown by. We have four areas of business. One is we sell medical supplies. Second is we sell medical equipment. Third is we do customized kitting and the fourth is we sell medical equipment. Third is we do customized kitting and the fourth is we have an exclusive contract with a company called BD. We sell the Pixis. So a little bit about the company, myself and we got a great team that's here, five dedicated reps that are here to hopefully help out and service all the customers and all the schools across this country.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Hopefully. I've heard a lot about medical shipment. I think I've seen you guys pretty prominent at Naxal too. Is that correct?

Dan Micic:

Yes, yes, yeah, that is correct. So one of the big hits that's over there and looking forward to this is every single year we do a puppy lounge. So we started this out two years ago and, deb I don't know, Jerrod or yourself, if you guys were able to stop by, but we've had some little pups that come by, little cats that come by, and the first year, I think, every single person actually they were able to, you know, take all the pups and they got all those dogs and cats to go to homes. Wow, yeah, adopted to all the people.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So that doesn't measure the needle or move the needle on the business side, but it's a little more altruistic, which I love.

Dan Micic:

Yeah, exactly, the business side is fun, but you've got to have fun as well, too, at the conferences.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So I want to go back to one of the areas though, and this is maybe it's a little farther away from me, but you said the BD Pixis machine. Can you give us a little more color there?

Dan Micic:

Yeah, yeah. So BD, I'm sure you guys all know the major company across the country, the PIXIS. It's a medication management system. Ultimately, it's like a smart vending machine for medications and the PIXIS is in 60% of hospitals across the country. Wow, Acute care settings, yep, and some fun statistics that I heard back from director of marketing over there. Over a million nurses across the country touch a Pyxis every single day and there's over 7 million medications that come in and out of Pyxis medication systems in acute care settings across the country every single day as well, too. Wow. So what we do is we sell the Pyxis to educational institutions all across the country. So you know, a big thing now is medication errors and trying to eliminate that and get students to train on these in the educational setting before they go into the real-world setting.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So this would still be simulation then, correct?

Dan Micic:

So a lot of people. That's a great question. A lot of people actually ask about that. It's actually the exact same thing of what you see in the hospital setting as what you would get into the educational setting. Wow, yeah.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Oh yeah, I mean it's huge, huge value add, because I mean then there's less confusion when it comes to time to practice and such Exactly, you don't want the uh, the nurse to come up and be like hey, I think I should be hitting this button.

Speaker 6:

I think I should be taking this medicine.

Dan Micic:

We want them to do this in the educational setting and then, once they go in the real world setting, they're very proficient on the medication dispensing unit, the PIXIS.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Yeah, I love it. So I want to touch on. There's four areas. You said kitting as well. I mean equipment and supplies. I think most of our listeners know about. I think it's pretty, but kitting can you give us a little more detail there?

Dan Micic:

So you know every single nursing school is either going to buy their supplies for their students and bring it in and then give it out to their students Some schools are switching over to. They want a laundry list of different supplies that the student's going to train on. They'll send us over a list. I'll give you an example. Let's say they want to learn IVs and you have a 50 mil bag, a 250 mil bag, and then the primary set, the secondary set, the core competencies on how to do proper IV from start to finish. We'll put that all together into a bag and then on top of that we'll put a logo onto the bag for branding purposes. So schools can have 20, 30, 40 different line items inside of that kit and then all those things of what they learn on throughout that semester or the year or years that they're there. That's what we'll put into the kit, custom for them.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So, for example and I'll bring them up a little later but Wright State, for example, would be able to put their school logo, school of nursing, et cetera. That would be for their four years, or however long.

Dan Micic:

Exactly, yep, yep. So let's say you have an RM program that's there and every single school is a little bit different. Some, you know, do it throughout the year, some do it two times out of the year, some do it multiple times throughout the year. But this year I think we did a little over two to 300 different custom nursing kit schools across the country and, I think, a little over 20,000 actual custom kits. Wow, yeah, okay.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So I want to go back to Wright State, because I ran into some people here at IMSH Maybe it was an Ohio thing, or maybe it was just Ohio State being in the national championship game. Yeah, nevertheless, there is some talk about some political action that happened at Wright State as well. Can you tell us a little bit more about that too, dan?

Dan Micic:

Yeah, definitely Jared. So lately over the last six months, six to eight months what I'm trying to do is bring more awareness to nursing the simulation market. If we start aligning with our local representatives, our congressmen, congresswomen, senators, I think those are the people that are going to move the needle and help us bring more awareness and, hopefully, more funding to this market. So growing the pie. Ultimately Yep, yep we definitely want to have more dollars to be able to have all these fancy booths and vendors and stuff going into these nursing schools.

Dan Micic:

So, with that being said, through some contacts and people, I was able to set a meeting with Senator Moreno Senator Bernie Moreno from Ohio to come out to one of the customers of ours, which is Wright State University, and he was able to come out for about 45 minutes and learn more about nursing in general.

Dan Micic:

You know, I think he had an understanding of just what a nurse is, but I don't think he understood really the nuances and the pain points and all the issues of what nursing schools deal with on a day-to-day basis. So we put together that meeting and the president of the school came out, senator Moreno came out with his team, so the senator was actually there at the school. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, senator Moreno was actually there. He did about. You know, it was roughly about a 45 minute tour Met with the president of the school, met with the dean of the nursing school, met with the director of the school, myself and the director of marketing over at BD, and the biggest thing was to try to bring more awareness. One about the PIXs how do they get the funding for it? How do we do that more with more schools across the country?

Jerrod Jeffries:

I think everybody understands that medication errors are a an issue that we need to combat within nursing well, nursing shortages, nursing turnover I mean here at the plenary sessions as well and, and I think that it's again quite back to maybe the altruism side of you, but, you know, bringing more awareness from a different angle of saying I I have no statistics on this, but where does funding come from A lot of these pieces? I believe it is grants or some sort of government funding in some way, shape or form. I mean, of course there's a few schools that have endowments and other things, but they probably got started with some sort of government funding that is correct.

Dan Micic:

So one of the biggest things that they get grants for for the PIXs was the Perkins grant In Ohio. The biggest things that they get grants for for the pixels was the perkins grant. Okay, in ohio there was another grant that we're talking about was it was called the rapid grant. I would I would assume it was something specific within ohio that was there. But just to bring that awareness, you know where do they go and get it, how do they get it, how do we, how do we come together as a group, the simulation group, and have one voice and really bring that voice to the people that are in power, our elected officials, to bring more funding, more awareness, just the issues that are at hand. The stat that I heard the average age of a nurse now is 55 years old. So how do we bring more nurses in? How do we bring quality of care to improve?

Speaker 6:

inside nursing.

Dan Micic:

And I think that starts with bringing this message to the people that are elected officials on both sides and hopefully you know, keep pushing that message along.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Yeah, well, I look forward to seeing if there's anything else in the future around that. Yeah, I think it's an important subject that I don't think we see a lot of in this space, like granted, I'm sure there's different people in silos doing a lot of things, but doing it for, I would say, the greater good. I hope there is, you know, some obvious benefit as well to medical shipment, but I think allocating more funding towards nursing is obviously a, you know, probably to myself and every one of our listeners. They're nodding their heads.

Dan Micic:

Yes, exactly, but you know, I start somewhere and I think that you're taking the first leap, which is very helpful hopefully be the pioneer that's on here, but, uh, with all the people that we have inside this industry really coming together, there's an advocacy group and one of the questions that I asked was what is the mission, what is the purpose, what are we trying to do to advocate? And they had different responses. So I think they came back and they said we're still working on that and I think that's okay.

Jerrod Jeffries:

I think we just need to come together as one group, figure out one message that's here and ultimately, ultimately, we want to try to better simulation and I think, with all the people that we have, we can do that, and that I mean now you're really speaking my language because it's grow simulation but also increase the benchmark, and you do that through right education, right partners and you to make sure that you know you're delivering the quality care for obviously better patient care, but obviously, and also putting in more numbers to say, okay, we don't have a shortage, where people are sleeping two hours a night because they have to keep working or just putting Band-Aid over Band-Aid instead of educating a more fuller workforce.

Dan Micic:

Yeah, yeah, exactly One day we're going to be sitting in that bed, jared and our family members are going to be sitting in that bed. You want to hope that we're going to have the best care. That's there. And I'm looking forward to working together more with, uh, some of the leadership inside and, I guess, some of the conversations that we had this morning. That's here and building off of that and and hopefully keep pushing forward beautiful yeah, well, Dan, I thank you for the time.

Jerrod Jeffries:

I hope the rest of IMSH goes well. I've seen a lot of people by the booth.

Dan Micic:

No puppies here at IMSH, come on by and see us in Denver for the puppies at an ASCO, perfect.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Well, thank you so much for the time and keep doing what you're doing. Thank you, jared, for having me. Thanks, take care.

Deb Tauber:

Welcome to another episode of the Syncamp Day, where we are live at IMSH 2025. Welcome, Dr Lou Clark and Dr Kathy Smith. So thank you for being on. Jared want to start us off.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Yeah, well, I think we've got a privilege here being with the new organization who's dedicated towards healthcare simulation, ASPE, and also Kathy Smith, so I want to hand it over to you two. First, tell us us a little bit about ASPE.

Dr Lou Clark:

Thanks so much, and Deb. So this is Lou, and ASPE has actually been around for well over 20 years and, believe it or not, next year, in 2026, we're going to celebrate our 25th conference. So we've been around for a while and we have nearly 1000 members in 44 countries around the globe and our main purpose is to support simulation education. That has to do with fostering human interaction between learners. We have great strides in communication skills training, but we also have other training too, and we accomplish all of this with our partners, simulated participants or SPs.

Dr Lou Clark:

And you notice I'm not saying standardized patients or simulated patients, I'm very specifically using the language of simulated participants. Simulated participants, that's right, because our SPs go beyond health care. So sometimes we work with superintendents of schools and leadership training. We've trained chaplains, police officers. So our training, really, while health care is such an important part of what we do and really probably the most significant part of what we do, our methodology expands disciplines and professions, and I'm here with one of my mentors and someone I look up to, Kathy Smith from Toronto. Yeah, kathy, can you add to that about just SPs and why they're important?

Dr Kathy Smith:

Yeah, so they bring a human dimension to simulation and they are part of the educational team. I want to just add to what Lou is talking about that there were reasons historically why they were called standardized patients. That had to do with high-stakes examinations and while SPs may work in high-stakes exams, we prefer to think of them as their performance. They are simulated participants whose performances can be standardized along a spectrum depending on the context. So in an educational session where there's a little bit more latitude for them to make choices, versus a high stakes situation, where high stakes exam situation where it's important that they have more scripted lines or they have to answer things in a similar way, but they're still simulating a performance. Because it goes back to the idea of person-centered care and that people aren't standardized. We're all individuals and it's helping health professionals to understand that.

Jerrod Jeffries:

I also feel it's much more inclusive. So I mean granted, as you said, we also feel like it's much more inclusive. So I mean granted, as you were saying, Lou, it's healthcare is your predominant industry or area where you see SPs, but I think it also adds a little more inclusivity across other areas.

Dr Lou Clark:

I think so that inclusivity is so timely. It's always been there for us, but it's even more timely now because so many of us have been asked to create formative simulations for students to practice speaking with, interacting with, communicating, with caring for patients and people of all walks of life, ethnicities, sexual orientations, genders, and we are often asked to create ages, we are often asked to create sims for just all kinds of practice opportunities, and that's even becoming, I think, more prevalent or just as prevalent as assessment, and assessment is how this all started.

Jerrod Jeffries:

So I want to take us into a little bit. What are some of ASPE's goals for 2025? What are we looking?

Dr Lou Clark:

ahead for the year. Yeah, so it's an exciting year for ASPE. We, as I spoke with you both in November, we are kicking off our inaugural year for the ASPE SP program accreditation. That is moving ahead strong and proud and we will be giving out our first you know certificates in that at our conference. Our conference is coming up June 1st through the 4th in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. We are also having we're really excited Kathy and I happen to be co-authors on a new publication ten of us as ASPE leaders and researchers and it's called call to action honoring, honoring SPs and Collaborating with SP Educators, and so we've been talking about it throughout the conference and it really lays out some tenets around what we've just described that we've always known within our community, but we really needed to put them down in a concise way on paper and that's what we did.

Dr Lou Clark:

So this is a peer-reviewed editorial calling for increased collaboration with SP educators around SP education, and we've been promoting it throughout IMSH. And how do you feel about the conference this year? So I think it's been a really great conference for us and I really want to thank SSH President Barry Eisenberg. On the Saturday or Sunday plenary I was privileged to accept presidential citation with immediate past President Sean Gilleen for ASPE and all the work that we've done, and I think it's very meaningful that SSH leaders have recognized ASPE as the association with the depth and breadth of expertise in human simulation. We've also been privileged to collaborate as a part of a work group that's comprised of leaders of INAXCL, simghost, SSH and ASPE looking at the job classifications for SP educator, SP and simulation tech and ops specialist to work towards in the US getting those classified by the US Department of Labor, trying to bring some equity in job positions and compensation to our members. So we've been a big part of that as well.

Speaker 6:

Do you have anything to share? Yeah, maybe I could add. So I've been a long time member of ASPE and at one point I was the conference chair. But I'm currently on a couple of committees and one of them is the Standards of Best Practice Committee and we're currently revising the standards this year and we're doing a scoping review looking at how the standards have been cited since they were first published in 2017. And, as I speak, a manuscript has been submitted for standards of best practice for PETAs or physical exam teaching associates, so look for that to be published within the next six months or so.

Deb Tauber:

That's fantastic, much needed.

Dr Lou Clark:

Yeah, and I'm so glad Kathy mentioned that, and I did want to add that a new exciting feature of our conference this year in Montreal is the first ever human simulation research forum. So this is going to be a big part of our conference this year and we're very excited. We have a grants and research committee that's part of ASPE, working with other leaders such as Kathy and others to bring more of that programming to our members and bring in other folks as well who maybe are a little bit more research-oriented and might think this is exciting and decide we're going to come see you in Montreal. ?

Deb Tauber:

guys have any closing thoughts for the conferences we run? Things are going to shut down any minute.

Dr Kathy Smith:

Well, I think one of the things in the article, the call to action, is the idea that words matter, and many times and I know that I have done this in the past I don't know about yourself, lou, but using the term using as peace and they're human beings, or referring to them.

Dr Kathy Smith:

I've never done this, but people refer to using as peace and they're human beings, or referring to them. I've never done this, but people refer to them as tools, and we really have come to consciousness, and Deborah Nastel, who's a very prominent researcher in the area, really brought this to the attention of the larger world, and we've all gained awareness about it over the last several years, and so I think that in the editorial, we really want to emphasize how important it is. It goes back to the idea that SPs are also educational team members, and so you wouldn't say that you're using a faculty member or a faculty member as a tool in the simulation, and it's a reflection of how the people that the SPs are portraying are thought of. So we're not using patients. Our patients aren't tools, and so that's something that I know in a lot of research that I've been doing as well. I'm really looking at the language that I use when I talk about SPs, that I use when I talk about SPs, yeah, and I thank you, Kathy.

Dr Lou Clark:

And I would say that in the call to action we very specifically say don't use SPs. And the use is italicized for that very reason. And then we go on to ask the rhetorical question what does this mean? And it means exactly what Kathy said, because when you look at people as tools, you start to dehumanize them and then their psychological and physical safety is compromised. And SPs are so special because they are the one methodology here that is not inert, they are not inanimate objects, they are living and breathing and I think they're the highest fidelity because they most they're people, they're patients. So we're very passionate about that and I'm really excited to keep a line of inquiry moving forward robustly. And I want to call out Kathy and Deborah. Deborah was our senior author on the call to action. They just published a new book and we're going to be highlighting that in the research forum. So I'm going to embarrass her and say can you talk about your book?

Dr Kathy Smith:

Sure. So it's part of the Springer Comprehensive Healthcare Series and it's on geriatric simulation and it's a focus on working with older adult simulated participants in the care of older adults, and older adults are identified by the WHO as being over 60 years old, and so we know that as people age they can have cognitive changes, sensory changes, physical changes, and our current standards and methodology don't always account for that and we may not be working with clinical people who have that expertise. And so we thought that there was a need for this book, and Lou is an author on one of the chapters and we have colleagues.

Dr Lou Clark:

We have 66 authors all together in the book and it features a lot of scenarios, so we're hoping it'll be of use in the larger simulation community yes, it sounds like it will be, and I think you know just to kind of maybe wrap up Kathy's description of 66 authors, I mean that's pretty impressive, they've done an amazing job is so representative of our community, of of our human simulation community, because it's just such a collaborative and inclusive community and I think every time I have the privilege of speaking with anyone about ASPE, I always want to say that we are just here representing an incredible community of practice that it's just a pleasure to be a part of them.

Deb Tauber:

Congratulations.

Dr Lou Clark:

Thank you.

Deb Tauber:

Yeah, congratulations, thank you. Thank you so much for joining us and we appreciate your time and your passion, this work and Long live SPS.

Jerrod Jeffries:

Hey, thanks, that's exactly the idea.

Dr Lou Clark:

Thanks for having us, thank you.

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