By: Brendan Pauley
Submitted by: Michael Maury, UC-San Diego

Often times, when I am doing my best to explain my profession as a Standardized Patient Educator to friends or with people I meet, I am interrupted by my wife who exclaims, “Your explanation is too complicated.” She then proceeds to tell it in her own words which are much easier to understand. I was drawn to this article because it reminds me that most of the world still does not know that what we do is actually “a real thing.” In this article, author Brendan Pauley gives a wonderful summary of Simulation and Standardized Patient Education through the observation of the Interprofessional Center for Experiential Learning and Simulation (iCELS) at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, MA. Pauley reports that Ray King, education Program Specialist at iCELS puts it well when he says, “SPs are better than reviewing cases, talking with proctors, or reading a textbook.” While many of us know and deeply understand the importance of our work as SPEs, it is nice to have a kind and simple reminder of the magic we create in medical education. If you would like another way to explain, simplistically, this SPE profession (like I certainly do) please read further.

Read the full article in The Scarlet – The Student Newspaper of Clark University here.

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