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Dr. Rhonda Sparks glances past her patient at the heart monitor whose beeping grows more urgent by the second.

All signs point to a heart attack: shortness of breath, chest pain and irregular heartbeat.

She’s losing him.

An assistant starts chest compressions as another prepares the defibrillator. Meanwhile, sirens approach with another medical emergency, there’s no time to waste.

After one shock, she sees a spike in his heartbeat and his eyes open. She asks if he can hear them, and her shoulders rest when he says he can.

It seems like an everyday scene in emergency rooms around the world, but in this one, the patient never dies — because he was never alive.

His name is iStan, and he is one of more than a dozen state-of-the-art animatronic mannequins in use at the OU Health Science Center to train medical and nursing students in clinical, communication and teamwork skills, Sparks said.

OUHSC unveiled Thursday a new 22,000 square foot training center, which uses the lifelike mannequins and highly trained actors to stand in for patients as students and local medical professions learn, said Dewayne Andrews, dean of the College of Medicine.

He said the entire facility cost $3.6 million collected from grants, donations and college funding.

The early years

From the beginning of modern medicine, the only way doctors like Sparks could learn how to handle the stress has been through years of experience.

“‘See one, do one, teach one’ is what we used to say,” Sparks said. “Once I’d watch something and an instructor had talked to me about it, then I could perform that procedure. Then once I could perform that procedure, I was responsible to teach someone else.”

She said some students wouldn’t gain as much experience as others because of random chance, poor mentoring or even simple shyness. The training center allows the university to standardize the learning experience for all students and even tailor the lessons to the students’ strengths and weaknesses.

Not your average mannequin

The work horses of the center are the dozens of computerized, full-size mannequins, including iStan, the most realistic simulator currently available, according to the OUHSC Web site.

He simulates blinking, breathing, urinating and a built in speaker allows trainers in the monitoring room to speak for him, Sparks said. Monitors are attached to his skin and simulated data is sent to them to mimic real conditions depending on the situation.

iStan’s spine, neck, arms and hips all move with life-like realism and are controlled completely wirelessly, she said.

“You don’t always encounter a patient in a bed, they could be on the floor, between a chair and the wall,” Sparks said. “You may have to put a collar on, he can be used for that.”

Andrews said other simulators mimic a variety of conditions and situations like a birthing simulator or a mannequin that can actually detect the different types of anesthesia it inhales through the mouth.

He said one mannequin can cost up to $300,000. Versatility is what makes the mannequins so valuable, each with hundreds of possible conditions and situations.

Working with people

Though the mannequins give an accurate simulation of serious medical conditions, they cannot help students learn bedside manner. This is where the 44 trained actors, called standardized patients, can enact dozens of serious conditions and help the trainees learn to deal with difficult patients and situations, said Michelle Wallace, standardized patient coordinator.

Paul Smith, a retired Oklahoma City actor, has been helping train doctors by enacting patients for six years.

He said their training involves mastering tough physical conditions like partial paralysis and learning examination procedures from a patient’s perspective so they can give feedback to students as they work.

“The chance to get out of the library, the chance to get out of the classroom and away from text books reminds us of why we actually came here, and it’s the people,” said Cole Wootton, medical student.

Teamwork is one of the main topics the training center focuses on, bringing all aspects of medical care together, so each trainee becomes comfortable relying on each other.

“Students can come, residents can come, as well as the nurses and the physicians that are all can involved,” Sparks said. “When something goes wrong, who gets the equipment, who notifies the appropriate people, who runs this when things go wrong. That’s what we can practice here.”

Custom made

When a trainee is performing a procedure, instructors monitor the progress and can alter the situation in real time to force the students to adapt to emergencies.

“If they get too relaxed, we’ll throw a kink in there,” Sparks said. “One of the best is you can actually take one pupil and blow it out. It really throws them off.”

Students without this type of training often do not learn how to deal with these problems and make snap decisions until they are working with real patients.

Procedures are also recorded with cameras and microphones so instructors can show students what they’ve done right and wrong.

Wootton said training is invaluable because it is so immersing trainees learn what it’s like to work in a real setting, which builds confidence.

“Sure we know the situation is simulated, we know the patients we are interviewing, they’re only mimicking real life diseases and scenarios, but once you get into the moment you kind of lose all that,” Wootton said. “You’ll be sitting there interviewing a patient...and feel like you’re across the street in an actual clinic.”

Medical students aren’t the only ones to benefit from the new center; area physicians, nurses, surgeons and physician assistants can complete their yearly training sessions at the center.