Supportive Environment
Our facilities include fully equipped nursing laboratories that simulate the type of physical environment that students will experience as they move beyond the campus for clinical placements and patient care. An interactive virtual health environment provides an additional learning aid that students can use at home.
Nursing laboratories
Leading-edge facilities
ACU National Schools of Nursing at the North Sydney Campus (MacKillop), Melbourne Campus (St Patrick's), Ballarat Campus (Aquinas) and Brisbane Campus (McAuley at Banyo) have sophisticated nursing laboratories where students can practice their nursing skills. The laboratories have simulated wards, private rooms, Isolation Room, Simulated bathroom/toilet, Medication/Treatment Room, Preparation Room, Storage Room, Compactus, centralised demonstration benches and a private study area.
Students learn and practice nursing skills on technologically-advanced mannequins, including paediatric mannequins. The mannequins lie in hospital beds in a simulated modern ward. The mannequins can be programmed for different clinical scenarios by setting the heart beat, respirations and lung sounds, blood pressure and bowel sounds. They can also make verbal noises such as coughing, groaning, vomiting, screaming and saying "yes" and "no" which can be altered via remote control.
State-of-the-art equipment
The North Sydney Campus School of Nursing has three Advanced Life Support mannequins which can be programmed with different scenarios, such as a progression of cardiac rhythms until cardiac arrest at which time the students can defibrillate. The mannequins are connected to a cardiac monitor via a laptop computer. Students can perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and cardiac compression on them and administer oxygen therapy.
The School of Nursing, Melbourne Campus, has recently acquired a state of the art Bedside Monitor with a Multiparameter Simulator. The equipment is able to simulate ECG, blood pressure, respiration, temperature, pacemaker, artifact and arrhythmic conditions that would all be found in a hospital ward environment.
All simulation settings are read easily on the clear, built-in LCD. Tests and simulations can be selected quickly and easily by choosing menu selections, by using front panel keys to enter numeric codes for action, or by using computer control.
The Bachelor of Midwifery students at Melbourne are able to see a simulated fetal and maternal electrocardiogram occurring during labour as well as a selection of pressure waveforms produced by uterine contractions.
High staff:student ratio
With small classes and only three to four students around a bed, there is plenty of opportunity for nursing students at all campuses to develop their clinical skills and help is on hand at all times. Students can also book practice rooms in the laboratory with a bed and a mannequin to carry out procedures they have learnt, especially when revising for assessments.
Nursing skills
The scenarios developed reflect the student’s year level and curriculum topics. First year students are introduced to basic care scenarios such as providing hygiene, toileting, patient handling, colostomy care, bedmaking, medication administration, basic CPR, aseptic technique, suture removal, patient assessment, Pressure Area Care, urinalysis, taking vital signs, documentation and standard precautions.
The scenarios become increasingly complex as the students progress to years two and three to include clinical skills associated with intramuscular injections, drug reconstitution, intravenous therapy, syringe drivers and infusion pumps. Students learn which infusion line goes with each pump, and the correct procedure for the administration of an intravenous medication.
They become proficient in Patient Controlled Analgesia, complex aseptic technique, mental health assessment, tracheostomy care, suctioning of lung secretions, insertion of naso-gastric tube, cardiac care, arrhythmia interpretation, chest drain management, IDC insertion, nasogastric tube insertion and management, PEG tubes, Central Venous Catheters, epidurals, blood glucose monitoring, urinary catheterisation (male and female), identification of breast lumps, palpation of uterus, care of central line, insertion of airways and advanced CPR. Students also carry out blood transfusions using red food dye.
Actors are commonly used for mental health practicals in which the actors simulate the symptoms of various mental illnesses for student assessment. Students also have the chance to train in pre-operative discussion about deep breathing and leg exercises with scripted students and volunteers.
Practicals based on clinical scenarios
Every week, the mannequin ‘patients’ are assigned a case history based on a real clinical scenario. Students at the North Sydney Campus prepare themselves for the practical session in the nursing laboratory by logging on to the interactive Virtual Health Environment (VHE) beforehand. Based on a dummy medical system in liaison with St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, the VHE enables students to access patient information, identify areas for further investigation, and research databases to support medical and nursing interventions. As the week progresses in the simulated ward, the ‘patient’s’ health varies just like a real patient. Students nurse the ‘patient’ using up-to-date-equipment such as the latest ECG machines, BSL monitors, hydraulic hoists, pneumatic underlays, pulse oximeters and oxygen (compressed air) and suction outlets that built in to bed sites.
At the Brisbane Campus, interactive CD ROM, Internet access and a locally developed virtual community complement the bedside laboratory strategies. The laboratory at Brisbane also has a range of texts and videos available for student use.
The thorough training in the nursing laboratories at ACU National equips students for life on a real ward, so that when they go to their first clinical placement they find they are well-prepared.
