Transforming Nursing Education with Immersive & 5G/10G Technology
Kesa Herlihy, PhD, RN, CNE Clinical Associate Professor and Simulation Education Program Director & Doug Hohulin, Advisor Volunteer Affiliate Faculty, University of Kansas School of Nursing
Nursing is experiencing a critical shortage, but schools of nursing cannot increase enrollment to meet the country’s needs for nurses. In 2021, more than 76,000 qualified nursing students were turned away from nursing schools due to insufficient faculty, clinical sites, classroom space, and budget. The mobile industry offers Gbps 5G technology. The cable industry is developing Gbps 10G technology. The University of Kansas School of Nursing is developing 5G and 10G virtual immersive experiences for nursing students to broaden access to nursing education for prospective students in rural and urban areas and to support practice-ready new graduates.
Compared to traditional, on-campus simulation labs with manikins, our solution leverages immersive VR nursing education to provide students access to their instructors and virtual campus remotely, where they can learn about the body and its systems as well as simulate care for patients of all different socioeconomic statuses, races, genders, ages, and sizes who would otherwise be unavailable to these students. Transitioning from a solely on-campus curriculum to a widely accessible program of study will allow students from all cities and regions in Kansas and across the country to complete a traditional nursing baccalaureate degree from a nationally recognized nursing program and serve their communities in. In short, using a VR immersive nursing school program will increase access for students to pursue a nursing education and address the critical need for more nurses.
Our effort for this solution started 2 years ago with the AR/VR Animating Manikin Team project that won 1st Prize in the AR/VR Hackathon to use XR to lower the cost of existing $30K-$200K Manikins Medical Solutions to Nursing Schools. We are working to improve the manikins currently used for training using XR to create a more realistic training experience at a lower cost, and allow for remote immersive training of healthcare professionals.
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To help solve the nursing crisis and prepare for the transition from physical Simulation solutions to Virtual Solutions, we are introducing an Immersive Nursing Education Project that addresses:
- Accessibility: bolster prospective student enrollment and pipeline of students into nursing school to address deficits in the field) and
- Engagement: to move from a cohort-based learning delivery program to a more engaging and effective competency-based curriculum delivered virtually, meeting the students “where they are at”).
Our goals are:
- The development of highly engaging, competency-based VR content for nursing students.
- A widely accessible platform such that students can learn from anywhere in the country
Our solution is to bring together the virtual curricula and to learn delivery platforms as provided by VR companies, Meta (Facebook), VictoryXR, and Bundle of Rays, the University of Kansas School of Nursing faculty and research expertise, and the support of 5G/10G technology to remove latency and connectivity barriers. Without 5G/10G technology, we would be forced to limit our content and restrict students’ ability to connect seamlessly at any time and or place. VR platforms that provide students with immersive experiences in the metaverse have been documented to improve learning outcomes via engaging simulations (Merchant et al., 2014).
As part of our pilot program with VictoryXR, we will be putting 50 nursing students into Quest 2 VR devices for the first time for VR Health Assessment Classes. We will roll out a digital twin, replica campus for students to attend whether they are on campus or learning remotely. https://www.victoryxr.com/ten-metaversities-launching-in-u-s-this-fall-in-first-victoryxr-cohort/
Too often, immersive education is downgraded due to the limitations of bandwidth and current communication networks. To truly live into the full potential of the benefits of this proposed virtual platform and achieve the goals of what would possibly be a very highly effective immersive education, 5G/10G is needed in both the home and in the classroom. Our Immersive Nursing Education Project is made possible and supported by 5G/10G technology that addresses logistical connectivity and latency capacity. It has the potential to produce more nursing students and ultimately meet the needs of both rural and urban communities in the USA and globally, where there exists a high demand for nurses. Without 5G/10G technology in our solution, nursing students will be limited by their existing connection, latency, and capacity available at their respective homes.
The beauty of our solution is twofold. It allows increased accessibility for prospective students (thus broadening the pipeline of students into nursing) while also improving equity of the learning experience by allowing students to work with patients of all different socioeconomic statuses, races, genders, ages, and sizes via virtual technology. The virtual platform affords students the opportunity to spend clinical time with a wide range of patients who would otherwise be unavailable to them. This will give students the tools to handle a diverse range of situations more effectively while also providing them opportunities to navigate the healthcare industry more efficiently in a new role or region.
To be sure, VR and this type of metaverse education are taking hold at universities across the country. More immersive and engaging than a simple online Zoom class, these VR experiences are truly establishing the future of virtual learning. Despite physical distance or other accessibility obstacles, students have been shown to be able to engage both with their professors and with one another in ways that in-person, site-based experiences would not allow. The learning outcomes corroborate these claims; findings from accountancy firm PwC on the advantages of using VR for learning findings have shown that 40% of VR learners are more confident in applying what they have been taught, and 150% are more engaged. XR devices are going to be as disruptive to our world in the late 2020s as smartphones were in the 2010s and cell phones & PCs in the 2000s. In 10 years, XR devices will replace the smartphone for a fully immersive experience that is indistinguishable from the physical world – combining the digital and physical worlds. This technology is critical in solving the problem of immersive education and supporting “Practice Ready Nurses” on day one after graduation.