Ridgewater rolls out mobile medical training classroom

Not only is it challenging to recruit top-notch professionals to rural areas, but keeping them trained on the latest techniques can be costly because they have to travel away from their clinics and hospitals for the training.

That may no longer be the case for many health care providers in Greater Minnesota thanks to a state-of-art mobile classroom now available through Ridgewater College’s Customized Training and Continuing Education division.

SimLab L1 was introduced last week at the Hutchinson and Willmar campuses. The 46-foot-long semi-trailer is equipped with what looks and functions as an emergency room. A debriefing room allows trainees to see video of their sessions in order to critique their response to various medical situations.

SimLab L1 uses the latest in high-tech simulation technology to educate and train health care and emergency response professionals, Kathy Schwantes, dean for the college’s customized training department, said during the lab’s unveiling at Hutchinson on Wednesday.

Funding for the $1.5 million lab was provided by numerous private and corporate donors giving through the college’s foundation.

“We could not have done this without them,” Schwantes said of the donors and foundation. The capital campaign totaled $3 million.

Read more about Ridgewater’s mobile health care classroom in the Leader’s Tuesday, June 30, print edition.

(Terry Davis is a Hutchinson Leader staff writer. E-mail him at davis@hutchinsonleader.com.)