Sim Baby

In December 1998, the Department of Anesthesia welcomed "NORMAN" (NORmal MAN), a new teaching tool to its residency program. It is our computerized human patient simulator (HPS).

Our HPS, the only one in New Jersey, is a three-dimensional interactive model. It combines lifelike hardware with computerized physiologic models of human organ systems. Physically, the simulator looks and sounds like a real patient. It has a head with blinking eyelids, reactive pupils and a controllable airway. The pulses are palpable, the breath and heart sounds are audible, it breathes and has an arm that twitches with stimulation. The simulator is monitored like any patient in the operating room complete with ECG, pulse oximetry, mean arterial, pulmonary artery and central venous pressure tracings. Computer models run these systems, accurately emulating human physiology. Parameters can be set to control how each system functions and responds to interventions. The simulator employs a pharmacologic system that produces realistic dose-related pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic responses to injected or inhaled "drugs". The result is an interactive model that can be "anesthetized" and managed through a variety of scenarios that provide educational opportunities for medical students, anesthesia residents and even more experienced attending anesthesiologists.

Health care providers interested in learning further about the Robert Wood Johnson simulator may contact Mordechai Bermann, MD, Director of the Human Patient Simulator Lab:

Call (732) 235-7827 or E-mail the HPS Lab

The Department of Anesthesia at Rutgers-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School operates an anesthesia Human Patient Simulator (Medical Education Technology, Inc., Sarasota, FL)