Using simulations of acute care to aid stroke patients
The sooner a person suffering a stroke receives medical attention, the better the outcome is likely to be. To cure the patient, it is optimal to complete the diagnostic assessment within 30 minutes and initiate treatment immediately.
This where scenario training for medical staff is beneficial, to help with optimizing cooperation between emergency services, a hospital’s admission department, and physicians and nurses.
CESNET, the national research and education network of the Czech Republic, has developed a digital infrastructure (UltraGrid) that enables the use of simulation technology in this kind of scenario training. The technology is used in specialized simulation workplaces such as the Simulation centre (SICE) at the University Hospital at St. Anne in Brno. The centre consists of a room that faithfully replicates the appropriate workplace of the hospital, a control room, where the physician can influence the course of the simulation, and a debriefing room, where the simulation can be monitored in real time, and reviewed afterwards.
Responding to emergencies efficiently
The simulation is based on a pre-prepared scenario, with a trained actor as the patient. Events at all simulated stations (patient admission in the hospital, including contact with the medical emergency services, all patient examinations, including the simulated CT scan and follow-up patient care) are captured by cameras and transferred to the debriefing room in real time. The displays from other selected devices are also transferred to the viewers, creating, together with the camera images, a complete overview of the current state of the patient.
This scenario training based on simulation technology enables both pre-hospital and hospital staff to respond to these types of emergencies more efficiently, since the rate at which the patient receives hospital care from the onset of stroke symptoms is critical.
The simulation setup uses UltraGrid, the open source software for low latency and high-quality video network transmissions developed by CESNET. Aside from scenario training, UltraGrid is used in a variety of settings, from music and dance events to transmission of open-heart surgery at medical conferences.
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