It contains a 17 bed Nightingale ward, a high dependency unit, an area devoted to child nursing and a midwifery area including a birthing bed. There is a resuscitation trolley, hoists to lift patients, ECG equipment, thermometers and bedpans. The simulated ward environment enables students to learn in a safe and supervised environment before their clinical placement. Importantly, all the health professions work together in the Skills Lab. Issues such as infection control, life support, and patient safety affect all of them.
Smaller bedrooms give students experience of nursing patients at home in the community.
These are particularly relevant for the care of patients at different stages of rehabilitation. The facilities of the Skills Lab are being added to constantly. It already includes observation suites for teaching of counselling skills, a large flexible teaching space, wheelchairs, and computers and specialist software. The Skills Lab has been in use since early this year. At the Opening Ceremony David Parr, Chairman of Kent Education Consortium, and Sheilagh Titchener, Dean of the Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work, welcomed the investment by the College and the Consortium, and praised the opportunities that the resources provide for new students entering health professions.