Twenty-two high schoolers gasped and jumped in unison as the Human Patient Simulator blinked its unseeing eyes at them.
Drew Gonsalves, a simulation engineer for the UF College of Medicine department of anesthesiology, then explained how the standard man, or “Stan, ” replicates human functions such as maintaining a pulse, exhaling CO2 and responding to medical techniques. Gonsalves gestured to Stan’s pulse points as the high schoolers crowded around the prone simulator, feeling for the rhythmic thumping of Stan’s automated heartbeat.
The demonstration in the simulation lab was one of the final exercises of the Health Care Summer Institute, a monthlong program designed to introduce high school students to health professions as a precursor to college life. The Office for Diversity and Health Equity and UF Health co-sponsor the program. Students from Florida’s panhandle to the northeastern coast got a taste of college life for four weeks beginning June 15.
The program accepts students from cultures that are underrepresented in the medical field, such as African-American, Latino, Native American and Pacific Islander students. Additionally, people from rural areas, regardless of their cultural backgrounds, qualify as underrepresented populations in medicine, said Michelle Jacobs-Elliot, M.D., the assistant dean for diversity and health equity and HCSI program director.
Six college students or graduates work as counselors to mentor the high school students. Counselor Janet Lopez, a rising college junior, attended HCSI when she was a rising high school junior.
Originally from Pierson, Florida, a small, one-traffic-light town west of Daytona Beach, Lopez grew up surrounded by Caucasian and Latino populations but experienced little in terms of cultural diversity. Lopez took it upon herself to research summer health care camps and attended one at Florida State University before discovering HSCI.
