Emergency crews practice skills with high-tech human simulator

Front, Pat Richards, Education Coordinator for Great Plains Regional Medical Center, demonstrates some of the features of iStan to McCook Fire Department and Community College representatives Thursday morning. Back row, from left, McCook firefighters Mike Schoenemann and Shane Smith, McCook Community College paramedic instructor Bob Molcyk, firefighter Rick Metcalf and Fire Chief Marc Harpham. (Bruce Baker/McCook Daily Gazette)

McCOOK, Nebraska -- McCook Fire and EMS personnel, along with McCook Community College paramedic students and their instructor, were able to participate in training Thursday that uses some of the latest and greatest trauma simulation technology available. Representatives from Mid-Plains Community College brought iStan to McCook, a patient simulation dummy that is hailed as being unlike any other simulator available.

According to Pat Richards, Education Coordinator Great Plains Regional Medical Center, iStan is designed to help with critical thinking skills and simulate difficult scenarios. The high-tech dummy, which Richards said had an approximate price of $85,000 before software, has a multitude of features that allow for training scenarios from CPR to surgery.

"You can start an IV, trach him, we can make him display symptoms such as his tongue swelling, provide lung and bowel sounds and even go as far as making him pee himself," said Richards. iStan is also anatomically correct and convertible to either gender.

Richards explained that the features and software of iStan were so advanced that they were limited only by our imagination. The simulator is wireless and requires only a laptop computer to accompany it on training exercises. It can be laid down or seated in an upright position to simulate automobile accidents.

The technology and simulator includes not only the life signs and symptoms of a patient, but also provides the unique ability for emergency responders to ask questions that iStan can respond to.