Sixth graders from Zavala Elementary School will learn how germs can spread, about the value of exercise and watch blood pressure and heart rates being monitored on simulation mannequins during a Jan. 30 event at The University of Texas at Austin School of Nursing.
The program, called the Longhorn School Bus, will be held from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the School of Nursing, 1700 Red River St. Longhorn School Bus won first place last year for the National Student Nurses Association’s best breakthrough to nursing project.
The children will rotate through various activities, including “Eat Right, Hygiene,” “Get Fit and Have Fun,” “Organs” and “Nurses are No. 1.” Zavala students will learn about nutrition by making a log with celery, apple butter and raisins. They will learn how to properly wash their hands and how germs can spread in the hygiene activity.
The elementary school students also will learn how exercise can be fun and about the different organs of their bodies in an organ toss through “Organ Man,” a mannequin with holes cut out of his middle. In the “Nurses are No.1” activity, the children will learn that anyone can be nurse.
They also will tour the school’s simulation laboratory, an environment where nursing students practice and demonstrate nursing skills. The simulation lab has three rooms with six patient units that include equipment such as IV poles, simulated oxygen and suction. Five computerized simulation mannequins, including a newborn infant, have software that provide physiologic responses such as change in heart rate, blood pressure, heart tones, murmurs, breath sounds, bowel sounds and full vocalizations.
