SENATOR Pia Cayetano called the Clinical Simulation Laboratory of the University of the Philippines College of Medicine a game-changer in medical education and training in the country.

The laboratory was first introduced to Cayetano in 2020 when the panel she chaired, the Senate Committee on Sustainable Development Goals, Innovation, and Futures Thinking, conducted a hearing on the futures of health.

“We felt funding the laboratory was perfect because we need to be able to show the whole country how we can transform the delivery of healthcare through available technology,” she recalled.

Cayetano said that the funding of the laboratory was made possible with the support of Senate Finance Committee Chairman Juan Edgardo Angara.

Dr. Maria Julieta Germar, director of the UPCM Clinical Simulation Laboratory, said the facility will allow students to experience clinical scenarios using mannequins that can be programmed to simulate patients in different medical distress such as cardiac arrest or bleeding after a normal birth delivery.

Students will learn to diagnose and treat the mannequin while their professor can manipulate the scenario by programming the mannequin to respond to the treatment.

The students are then given feedback, thus making learning experiential while in a safe space.

“Medical science is rapidly being shaped by virtual reality and artificial intelligence. This is also what we must aspire for as our preferred future,” she said.