Hartford Business Journal

14 Hartford Business Journal • January 23, 2017 www.HartfordBusiness.com training capabilities and services, which include surgical and other medical certifications, mock training exercises and medical device and product testing. Administrators say the expansion will help them create new relationships with biomedical and medical device com- panies and other cor- porate players who need training cen- ters located in real- world healthcare settings as well as feedback from doc- tors on new devices and products. CESI already pro- vides training certi- fications for various robotic surgery sys- tems, such as da Vinci and MAKOplasty, and has forged research and development and other partnerships with major compa- nies like Johnson & Johnson, Stanley Black & Decker and Medtronic. A ppr ox i m a t ely 11,000 people from near and far train at CESI each year — from within and outside of Hartford HealthCare — includ- ing surgeons, nurses, U.S. Navy corpsmen, first responders and even paramedics from Israel. "We're an importer," Hartford HealthCare President Jeffrey Flaks said during a tour of the facility, which will more than double in size to about 50,000 square feet. "We bring people to Connecticut who get their train- ing, they stay in our hotels, they fly into our airport, they eat in our restaurants. This is an economic driver." The state granted the project $15 million several years ago and the addition is tak- ing over adjacent space that used to be an employee gym. The expansion was originally slated for completion in 2014, but the hospital said state funding cuts forced administrators to prioritize projects, and the recently opened $150 million Bone & Joint Institute came first. CESI's expanded facility is now expected to open in March. The center, which has been in its current location since 2010, represents a total invest- ment of more than $34 million. Besides being an economic driver for the surrounding area, administrators hope it can be a financial driv- er for Hartford Hospital. Post expansion, Flaks said he expects CESI to break even on its annual budget, which he said is "north of several million dollars." The expansion aims to bring in more rev- enue from government training contracts, rental income, philanthropic donations, and manufacturers that want their products evaluated by doctors. Stanley has already donated $500,000 and could increase that amount in the near future, according to Ste- phen Donahue, the center's program direc- tor, who said CESI will be testing equipment for Stanley. A Stanley spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. Some of the corporate arrangements are confidential, but one is with Massachusetts- based Zoll, which makes defibrillators and other devices. CESI and Hartford Hospital doc- tors provide feedback to Zoll on new products and also help train the company's sales staff. Zoll pays rent and CESI doctors receive sti- pends for evaluating products, Donahue said. Another partnership is with MAKOplasty manufacturer Stryker. CESI is the exclusive Northeast training provider for the robotic- arm-assisted technology that helps with joint replacements. The device is used to perform knee surgeries at Hartford Hospital's newly constructed Bone & Joint Institute. Another feature of the CESI expansion is a larger cadaver lab, which administrators say is in high demand among companies in the region wanting to test new products. Flaks said there are early positive signs that the growing facility will stir more busi- ness. Hartford HealthCare officials are in talks with an out-of-state biomedical com- pany, for example, to relocate its headquar- ters near the hospital campus. He declined to name the company, as the deal is not yet done. While corporate partnerships were harder to forge a decade ago, Flaks said CESI has become a draw for companies and healthcare organiza- tions that want a combination of simulation and real-world medical care and expertise. Surgeons could go to an office park to train on a simulator, but being located within the heart of a hospital campus allows trainees to observe operating room activities, he said. A century of technological advancement In the 1910s, long before CESI was ever dreamt up, nurse trainees at Hartford Hospi- tal used a mannequin named "Mrs. Chase" to practice bathing and dressing patients. The hospital still has Mrs. Chase, which is stored in the closet of an operating room simulator, alongside much more advanced mannequins that CESI staff use for training. The high-tech mannequins, made by Nor- wegian manufacturer Laerdal, can bleed, sweat, cry, have seizures and simulate vari- ous other symptoms. The mannequins have been a vital tool in training residents at the hospital, said Dr. Thomas Nowicki, CESI's medical director, who recalls sometimes working 110-hour weeks during his days as a medical resident. Now the rules have changed, and residents aren't allowed to work as many hours. "We have to find more efficient ways to train," said Nowicki, who was standing in the observation room of an operating simulator, where he can alter the vital signs of a manne- quin lying on the operating table and commu- nicate with residents providing treatments. Simulation exposes trainees to more diverse scenarios and allows them to be more hands on than they could be in the emergen- cy room, with live patients, and learn from their mistakes. "A resident may have seen one kind of heart attack," Nowicki said. "It's luck of the draw. Here, we can show them the top five types of heart attacks." Besides their usefulness for training doc- tors, mannequins have also helped Hartford Hospital improve its procedures and patient outcomes. For example, after CESI train- ing, the hospital lowered its rates of catheter infections and a birth condition known as shoulder dystocia, Donahue said. Mere feet away from Mrs. Chase's storage closet is Christopher Madison, CESI's simu- lation technology developer, who is working on an HTC virtual reality headset. Madison, with the help of interns from the University of Hartford and Trinity College, is building training applications for surgeons and others. In a demonstration, the headset displayed a human body, which can be "sliced" by a hand-held controller into various cross sec- tions. There's also a virtual operating room, in which the user can pick up items from the counter and perform other actions. Madison is still toying with the technol- ogy, but is hopeful it can be a useful train- ing tool for surgeons and others. A virtual reality patient can display subtle symptoms that even the most advanced mannequin can- not, he said. "You can do some neat stuff," Madison said. "It has a lot of potential." n Innovation center seeks corporate ties from page 1 A team of Hartford HealthCare providers train on one of the Center for Education, Simulation and Innovation's mannequins. P H O T O | S T E V E L A S C H E V E R

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