UIHC’s new bundle of joy: It’s a boy! Or a girl!
The newest bundle of joy to arrive at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (UIHC) cries, blinks, and wets like a typical baby. Unlike most babies, though, it can train health care professionals in the care of seriously ill infants.
BabySIM—shown above with Kendra Brigham, a premed major and research assistant, and Suhas Kalghatgi, assistant professor (clinical) of anesthesia—is the world’s first interactive infant simulator that combines lifelike human physiological characteristics with software models that enable it to independently recognize and respond to medical treatment and drugs. This capability allows students to perfect the most critical infant care tasks through continual, realistic exercises in a risk-free environment.
The new BabySIM technology in the Simulated Patient Center in UIHC’s Department of Anesthesia is the first to be fully installed and functioning in a teaching hospital in the United States.
Among its lifelike features, BabySIM cries and urinates, and has lifelike pulses, heart functions and sounds, and eyes that dilate and blink. BabySIM can be either a boy or a girl.
Run from a laptop computer, BabySIM is capable of manifesting a host of emergency medical scenarios encountered in the operating room.
During emergency exercises, instructors can intervene and “throw a curve ball” to create realistic critical situations that challenge would-be lifesavers. If the students’ actions are correct, BabySIM will survive. Alternately, a wrong decision and administering an incorrect medication can send the simulated patient into cardiac arrest and perhaps even place BabySIM’s “life” in jeopardy.
by Tom Moore
Information arcade to grow
University Libraries will use a $236,000 grant from the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust of Muscatine to help expand and renovate the Main Library’s Information Arcade electronic classroom.
Construction is expected to begin in 2006. The project will add a second electronic classroom to accommodate ever-increasing demand from UI students and teachers. It also will add two electronic classrooms in the Hardin Library for the Health Sciences.
All three rooms are booked continuously throughout the academic year. The Information Arcade classroom alone has hosted more than 1,200 courses and taught 630,000 students and faculty since it opened in 1992.
FYI ceases print publication
At the end of its 42nd year of serving campus readers at The University of Iowa, fyi will cease publication with the current issue (vol. 42, no. 12, July 1, 2005).
fyi, the University’s faculty and staff newspaper, has been sent through campus mail to more than 12,000 faculty and staff members since 1964, at times as often as twice a month. Funds to produce fyi were reallocated as part of the GEF Task Force recommendations for FY06.
Nevertheless, we remain committed to providing University faculty and staff members a reliable source of news, information, and community pride and identity. In times of transition and economic uncertainty, the University community continues to need information. Just what new incarnation fyi will take is in the planning stages. For now, we are taking a brief hiatus from publishing fyi in any form as we consider the best options for producing it online.
As always, we appreciate hearing from readers. Let us know what you’d like to see in an online fyi. You may contact us via the e-mail addresses and phone numbers listed on our contact page, or you may e-mail us at fyi@uiowa.edu.
Finally, we thank you for your many years of interest and support. We hope to hear from you soon.
Big plus for UI math program
In recognition of its outstanding minority mentoring program, the Department of Mathematics in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences has received a 2004 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring.
Supported and administered by the National Science Foundation, the award—one of 14 given across the country—includes a $10,000 grant for continued mentoring work and a presidential commemorative certificate.
The department was nominated for the award by Carlos Castillo-Chavez, Joaquin Bustoz Jr. Professor of Mathematical Biology at Arizona State University.
David Manderscheid, professor and chair of mathematics, accepted the award on behalf of the department at a May 16 Washington, D.C., awards ceremony presided over by John H. Marburger, science advisor to President George W. Bush.
The award citation notes that the UI math department is the largest single awarder of math doctorates to minorities in the nation and that the department currently has 21 percent underrepresented minority graduate students.
Medal of honor goes to UIHC
University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics (UIHC) is among an elite group of U.S. hospitals to receive a special award recently in recognition of success in achieving a high rate of organ donation among potential donors.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration, awarded the first Organ Donation Medals of Honor to hospitals achieving organ donation rates of 75 percent or higher in a 12-month period.
The current organ donation rate at UIHC is 81 percent.
Apply for tuition assistance
The Tuition Assistance Program deadline for fall is July 20. This program allows eligible staff to apply for assistance to help defray the cost of tuition-only fees for one college credit course (up to four semester hours). This online application process, located on the Human Resources Self-Service Center web site (http://hris.uiowa.edu/selfservice), allows eligible applicants to complete and send an online application through the Workflow System for processing. For eligibility requirements and guidelines, visit www.uiowa.edu/~fusstfdv/stgtap.htm.
Funding for this program is provided through Human Resources central allocations and UI Staff Council Coca-Cola funds.
Application deadlines for the upcoming semesters are: July 20 (fall), Nov. 22 (spring), and April 20 (summer).
Energy curtailment possible
According to Facilities Management Work Control, this summer through Sept. 30, you may be asked to reduce your electrical usage during peak-demand times. As part of the University’s contract with MidAmerican Energy, the University agrees to curtail electrical usage up to 16 times, for up to six hours per occurrence.
Upon notification from MidAmerican of an energy curtailment, Facilities Management will notify all faculty, staff, and students via email. Facilities Management asks that all members of the University community do their part to help reduce electrical usage during these curtailment periods.
Oakdale Campus is not served by MidAmerican and therefore not included in the curtailment.
For more information on why the University is curtailing energy and how you can help, please visit www.facilities.uiowa.edu/uem/curtailment.
If you need additional information, please contact the Work Control Center at facilities-wcc@uiowa.edu or (33)5-5071. |
