Having recently celebrated its grand opening, the Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center will serve as a testing platform for innovation.

Education and research? Check! Innovation? We’ve got that too! But what may surprise you is how bold our vision really is.

Clinical simulation has come a long way in preparing healthcare professionals for practice. It's now the norm for medical schools and nursing schools. At the Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center, we have built an outstanding facility for training and education. We have a virtual inpatient and outpatient clinical environment, all the aspects of a working hospital, even a built-in apartment and ambulance bay to simulate various patient encounters. All of these spaces are wired for sound and video and tied into a state-of-the-art behavioral research software platform to create a world-class educational experience. But how else might we use this space at Jump?

Solving Problems in Healthcare
When virtual medical environments are not in use for education, these assets can be used to look at innovative technologies. Here, we can take a technology into the lab and really "kick the tires." When a device manufacturer tells us a piece of equipment is safer, better or more efficient, we can test those claims in the most robust way possible. With the vast array of clinical services and know-how within OSF and UICOMP, our subject matter expertise is top-notch. We can put real healthcare professionals into these testing simulations, in addition to testing these technologies. But that's just the start.

Solving "Pain Points" Through Innovation
In our quest for transformation of healthcare—prompted in no small part by our internal desire for care of the highest quality, and externally driven by change required by the Affordable Care Act—we will identify interesting opportunities. In the business world, these are known as “pain points.” Solve a pain point through innovation, and you may find there is a market for that idea. That is how educational institutions traditionally create spin-off companies and new technologies, and that’s what is so audacious about the Jump innovation program.

Where possible, we will be looking for opportunities to build a bio-innovation niche in Peoria. With Jump facilities as a testing platform, we believe the process of design, prototyping, and verification of claims is at our fingertips. It is a great environment for the field, and with our partners as resources, there is unlimited potential. Our bold goal is to become a hub of activity in the innovation space here in Peoria. Our metrics will include patents, licensed technologies and new companies—which means new jobs.

In my view, patients demand and deserve our best effort to improve the safety of care. There are no other opportunities out there that exist like ours. Our community will soon come to equate Jump with evidence-based innovation in healthcare quality and safety. iBi

Dr. John Vozenilek is executive director and chief medical officer of the Jump Trading Simulation & Education Center, and associate professor of clinical surgery at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria.