The Skills Laboratory

Welcome to the Skills Laboratory

The Faculty’s Skills Laboratory was the first of its kind in Africa, and since its inception in 1996, it has continually proven its worth in the training of health care professionals.  The Skills Laboratory is a well-established learning environment and forms an intricate part of learning for all students within the Faculty of Health Sciences.  It provides a foundation for critical reasoning, synthesis, and analysis of increasingly complex care scenarios.

The Skills Laboratory is equipped with a wide array of resources in order to provide a high standard of training.  We have mannequins ranging in age from infant to adult, male and female, and pregnant models to simulate the birth of a baby.  Most of the mannequins present with life-like features such as palpable pulses, voices, eyes that can blink and a rising and falling chest to simulate breathing.  These mannequins can also be manipulated, using a computer to have physiologically accurate responses to the care provided by students in different patient scenarios. A recent addition to further facilitate learning includes a control room with computers that monitor state-of-the-art, custom-designed audio-visual equipment in all of our observation rooms.  This allows lecturers to direct and evaluate student performance without being in the room and to conduct reflective discussions and video reviews after a simulated learning experience.

We are proud to provide students with a platform where they can synthesise their didactic and clinical knowledge into a meaningful whole before entering professional practice.