Virtual Training in Second Life
Posted by admin on December 14th, 2009
Have you experienced Second Life yet? It’s a virtual world where you can live, work, and play using an avatar with your characteristics. It’s become so popular that now some universities are beginning to use the virtual reality world as a means of training nurses and other medical professionals.
Using the virtual world gives students access to medical experts from all over the world that they may not have had access to in a traditional classroom setting. It also allows access to volunteers who act as patients that the students can diagnose using various diagnostic tests without accruing the costs associated with such an effort in a real medical setting.
Should a virtual world be used to train the individuals who care for us and our families? What happens when these individuals are thrown into a real-life situation? Sometimes it’s easier to diagnose and treat a problem from a distance when you know that your mistake won’t necessarily cost someone their life. Could this potentially be detrimental to the medical profession?
I can definitely see this being a fantastic resource in that it will connect world-famous specialists with medical students from all over the world. They can tap into the minds of these specialists and learn about their techniques and thought processes which can only enhance their own skill-set. BUT, I’m still a little skeptical. What do you think?
This entry was posted on Monday, December 14th, 2009 at 6:00 am and is filed under Online Education. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
