KANSAS CITY, Kan. – As a child growing up in California, Alejandra Buenrostro used to watch “Magic School” on TV. In the PBS film, Ms. Frizzle and his students ride a special bus that can take them on research trips to other difficult places, including inside the human body.
Now a bachelor’s student at the University of Kansas School of Nursing-Salina, Buenrostro has the opportunity to learn almost the same thing. By donning a headset that allows him to gather with his friends in a virtual reality (VR) replica of the KU School of Nursing, he will also be able to travel, like, in the human heart, looking at the tubules in the kidney. and explore both lungs.
This fall, the KU School of Nursing is one of the first 10 colleges, and the only nursing school, to launch their VR “Metaversity” through Meta’s Immersive Learning project. (Meta is Facebook’s new business name.) Also described as a digital twin university, these metaversities are part of Meta’s $150 million effort to increase access to education and change the way that the same learner.
“Instead of spending three hours listening to a lecture on breathing, you can listen to a lecture brief presentation and then spent 30 minutes of VR in the body,” said Kesa Herlihy, Ph.D. Simulation Education Program at KU School of Nursing. “It’s a completely different way of teaching. We have the ability to transform nursing education. ”
Tell people where they are
That revolution included not how people learned, but how many. Getting more people to get nursing degrees is important. The shortage of nurses in the country was severe even before the epidemic worsened, and there simply weren’t enough classrooms and nurses to train nurses. sick enough.
“Every year, 80,000 to 90,000 eligible students in the United States are turned away because we don’t have enough space in nursing homes. In Kansas, we have students from all over the state who are not in a position to move to Kansas City or Salina [to attend KU School of Nursing],” said Herlihy. “So we need to be able to tell people where they are. Virtual reality is one way to do that. ”
KU’s School of Nursing began exploring VR education in earnest during the global pandemic after classrooms were closed and access to many medical facilities was restricted. In the spring of 2021, Herlihy was on the team participating in a virtual/augmented reality campaign with KC Digital Drive, a non-profit organization working to make Kansas City a leader. digital. Herlihy’s team, which used augmented reality to create a realistic, interactive manikin for students to use to practice the technique, won the event. With a $7,500 prize, they bought five headsets and began exploring the full VR space.
At the end of 2021, the KU School of Nursing has partnered with VictoryXR, a VR company that creates metaversities, to create a digital twin of the university’s campus. The idea is for anyone, anywhere, to attend quality classes. As part of the partnership, Meta provided the school with 50 more VR headsets. Both undergraduate and graduate KU students will use Metaversity.
The goal is not to completely replace traditional classroom learning, but to include VR experiences that deepen understanding. Metaversity will also not replace the interaction between student nurses and real patients.
“We understand how important it is to have people-to-people, face-to-face interactions,” said Cynthia Teel, Ph.D., FAAN, director of education and research. teaching at the KU School of Nursing. “This will be an additional tool that we can use to better prepare students when they have valuable time with patients.”
Go to nursing school from the dining room
Now, students using headphones can stand on Rainbow Boulevard in Kansas City, looking at the KU Medical Center’s Murphy Building. They can enter the atrium in the nursing school and then go up to the first floor, where on the left they can find the examination room for Salina students, and on the right the room test for Kansas City. In these laboratories they will find laboratory and simulation facilities.
Until now, students have been using headsets to learn to evaluate patients in VR. Using avatars they create to look like their real selves, they enter a lab in the Metaversity that looks like a university lab. While there, they can conduct health assessments with “patients” by asking them questions while their instructors observe and measure.
Buenrostro was sitting at the kitchen table in his apartment in Salina when he conducted his first patient evaluation at Metaversity. It is interesting that the teachers even put a virtual poster on the virtual wall of the examination room that lists some questions that they should ask the patients, just in case anyone does not remember
“Another good thing about change is that my friend [a fellow student] and I can go back into the simulation,” he said. “We can enter the metaversity when we want so we can practice and see our strengths and weaknesses.”
Making a big difference in aging
KU’s School of Nursing could be completely virtual today, Herlihy said, if it were just a matter of taking virtual classes. It’s an immersive part, the magic school bus, which takes time. This product is slowly rolled out.
The school is working with VictoryXR and another VR company, Bundle of Rays, to create an effective nursing education course with three-dimensional virtual objects that students can touch, turn and control. Herlihy said he recently sent a list to VR companies asking for at least 40 items needed for students to learn how to do HEENT (head, ears, eyes, nose and throat). One eye. Eyes with glaucoma. One with cataracts. And so.
It’s a big project with many administrative issues still to be worked out, but Herlihy said he believes the school can have the most of Metaversity’s success, with all the experience. to be included across the curriculum, as soon as 2025. The School of Nursing will also. required to work with physician partners to facilitate additional clinical rotations and grow the program.
“Currently, we admit 138 students in Kansas City and Salina each fall, but the use of VR technology can allow us to admit even more,” Herlihy said. “This could make a huge difference in patient care.”
