IMSS Trains 30,000 Healthcare Workers in Simulation Centers

The Simulation Centers for Clinic and Surgical Excellence, located in Guadalajara, Mexico City and Merida, have trained 30,000 healthcare workers and were key to attend the COVID-19 pandemic, informed IMSS.

This training received by nutritionists, psychologists and stomatologists either at undergraduate or postgraduate level, administrative personnel, ambulance drivers and cleaning staff will have a positive impact in Social Insurance patients from any level of attention, according to Carolina Ortega Franco, Head of the Education and Investigation Unit of IMSS. “Thanks to technology and remote communication, we have been able to grow in trained personnel, especially in those COVID-19 related matters, because it was an emerging problem,” she said.

These three simulation centers are fully equipped and have contributed with in-person training for 7,000 workers, from which over 5,000 were doctors and 1,500 nurses. “In the Simulation Centers we have spaces that are highly detailed reproductions of doctors’ offices, operating rooms that have absolutely all the standards and regulations requested by the health sector for this type of spaces. We also have replicas of hospitalization areas,” explained Ortega.

The training facilities also protect potential patients from suffering harm during the healthcare workers’ preparation. “We reduce the risk of causing harm to patients during the teaching-learning process. A simulated environment is created with identical conditions to the reality of an emergency unit and intensive care,” said Ortega. Furthermore, these centers not only work on the technical part of the medical job, she explained, but are also helpful training and developing a human attention, communication, teamwork and leadership.

Ortega explained that healthcare workers, either public or private, who want to receive training in these centers, must visit the educational authorities of the state where each facility is located. IMSS will soon open a fourth Simulation Center in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon. This new project, said Ortega, is expected to begin construction later this year and open in 2022.

The newest Simulation Center opened back on Feb. 12, 2021, in Guadalajara, Jalisco, with a ceremony conducted by Zoé Robledo, Director General of IMSS, and Enrique Alfaro, Governor of Jalisco. “This is the best way to spend money when you want to look for a brighter future, always keeping in mind that every healthcare worker we train here is a potential trainer in the future,” said Robledo.