The Nursing Resource Center (NRC) provides students the opportunity to practice learned skills in a simulated hospital environment. As of the fall of 2016 the NRC has a new expanded facility in the Manning Academic Center (MAC) on the Owings Mills North Campus.
There are three large skills labs each with ten beds equipped with head wall systems that include oxygen and suction devices. These fully equipped skills labs allow nursing students to practice skills that nurses provide in the hospital such as nasotracheal care, transfers, physical care, vital signs, and injections. In Nurs 310, the first clinical course, medication and nursing skill carts are stocked based on the course content for each week allowing students to practice skills before implementing them in the hospital environment. In addition, through the use of a SimPad®, students control VitalSim® manikins to practice skills such as vital signs and the identification of heart and lung sounds.
Additionally, simulation training is incorporated into the nursing curriculum as a teaching strategy. This strategy provides the students the opportunity to practice in the clinical environment learning current medical and nursing practices along with patient safety and patient care. Through simulation scenarios, students learn to think critically, solve problems, and provide care in a safe, nonthreatening environment.
Our simulation laboratories include four, fully-equipped, state-of-the-art simulation rooms with the capability to record and review all simulation events. These rooms allow students to practice a wide range of competencies both on low and high-fidelity life-like manikins. Victoria is the newest of the manikins that allows students to practice labor and delivery skills as well as neonatal care with a Sim baby.
The NRC is staffed by Master’s degree-prepared registered nurses who provide personalized and competent instruction based on current literature and evidence-based practices.