Our Mission
The mission of the UAMS Centers for Simulation Education is to provide high-quality simulation for current and future healthcare professionals.
Clinical Skills Center
The Center for Clinical Skills Education is an education and assessment resource facility designed to support the learning objectives of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. The center is used for both teaching and assessing clinical communication and physical exam skills, and it is also a facility where students take their multi-station Objective Structured Clinical Exams (OSCEs) and Clinical Practice Exam Step 2 CS.
Located in the Daniel W. Rahn Interprofessional Education Building, the Clinical Skills Center recruits and trains simulated or standardized patients (SPs) for instructional and assessment exercises. We are committed to providing quality instructional and assessment programs to medical, pharmacy, nursing students, residents and other health care related professionals.
Standardized patient methodology has been established as a valid, reliable and practical method of teaching and evaluating medical students. A properly trained standardized or simulated patient can serve as a patient, teacher and evaluator, allowing our future health care providers the opportunity to practice and receive feedback on specific skills related to patient interviewing, physical examinations and issues of professionalism. Our ultimate goal is to prepare learner participants to be competent and compassionate physicians that provide quality, state-of-the-art patient care.
Standardized patients are individuals who are carefully screened and trained to simulate the signs and symptoms of an actual patient. The cases they portray are based on actual patient encounters experienced by physicians. Standardized patients are also trained to provide feedback to the learners, especially in the area of interpersonal communication.
The use of standardized patients allows medical students and faculty to experience:
Hands-on teaching, patient interaction, examination practice, and assessment of their clinical, professional, and communication skills in an authentic examination scenario
- Immediate feedback
- Patient-centered interviewing techniques
- Patient diversity and cultural differences
- Multiple diseases
- Visual monitoring through videotaping and/or web streaming technology