A Virtual Shift
Virtual Reality Training for medical professionals through COVID-19
By Corrin Avchin
Change is the only constant in the field of technology, and more so during the era of COVID-19 era. Health care professionals have to keep up to date on information that is constantly changing while not always having enough personal protective equipment (PPE) and dealing with the severe lack of testing available.
Wendy Morgan and Maggie Hubbell, co-founders of Shift, a female-founded tech company with roots in Eugene and Bend, have “shifted” from working on virtual reality simulations that combat implicit bias in the education sector to now train health care professionals on how to fight the novel coronavirus.
Training professionals in virtual reality keeps people safe from COVID-19 and the ability to practice on patients before actually entering a hospital according to Morgan. The sessions are short and involve physical movement. Morgan says she believes moving the physical body will help retain muscle memory when the day comes to help in a hospital and long-term care facilities.
Throughout the training, Shift’s virtual reality sessions can show health care workers what contamination would look like if people could see it, to represent where the virus can spread in a ward and after interacting with patients. “It raises an awareness of why you have to use extra precautions when donning and doffing PPE,” Morgan says.
Trainees learn the proper way of putting on and taking off PPE, appropriate care to patients who are infected and COVID-19 testing.
The University of Portland School of Nursing will provide content, medical device images from their training lab, help with scripting and training details in order for Shift to offer the training for free to users Morgan says. The company has a chief medical officer who reviews all of the training content for accuracy before becoming available, according to Morgan.
“It is the founding mission of Shift to help improve the lives of the people in our communities, whether it is through diversity training or COVID training. Shift has stepped up to serve our frontline health care workers in a time of crisis,” Morgan says.
With funding from Lane Workforce Partnership and East Cascades Works, Shift has the opportunity to create training across the state of Oregon, Morgan says. As Shift launches, the training will be spread out through the state and every location will have access to Oculus Quest headsets including the trained staff she says.
“We are also working with East Cascade Works in Bend to set up a mobile training site to go to the rural areas of the state,” Morgan says. “In Portland, the University of Portland School of Nursing is hoping to be able to set up a site there as well,”
Although training will be in a variety of locations, Morgan says she understands travel is not an option for everyone. She is now working to complete a web 360 version and a mobile app both, of which, will be available in the coming weeks.
Shift will not be profiting from the virtual reality work. The grants cover the cost of development, tech support, hardware and other costs associated with the setting up of sites for training, Morgan says.
The training will be held on Oculus Quest devices involving a headset and hand controllers that track physical movement. After each training, the headsets will have infrared rays kill viruses on each device to protect staff and trainees.
As Shift expands, Morgan hopes the training can be used for students finishing their clinicals and for professionals who need training in new circumstances. As the company grows, simulations involving implicit bias in the healthcare industry will emerge.
“Diversity and inclusion brought into the training can be representative of patients in care,” Morgan says.
Kristina Payne, the executive director of Lane Workforce Partnership, has been working with Shift to launch the virtual reality training in Lane County first. A long term goal is to help implement this training in long term care facilities.
“The demand in Lane County is significant and Shift could change the healthcare industry as we know it,” Payne says.
Shift will be launching in Lane County in the upcoming weeks and will continue to set up additional sites throughout the state.
“Health care has been turned upside down and with virtual reality training, we can help support the rebalance,” Morgan says.
For more information about Shift see Shiftbias.com
