Center for Innovative Learning and Teaching (CILT)

AR/VR technology can meld the clinical imaging data and information to build an anatomical
environment combining virtual and real, which is helpful to improve the interest of teaching and
the learning initiative of medical students, and then improve the effect of clinical teaching.
Current teaching practice in life systems and physiology courses consolidates the utilization of
different educational procedures to support the physical connections between structures. These
methods can include basic hands-on physical models, human and animal dissection labs, and
intuitive innovation. The effort by Touro University California to educate medical students with
the help of AR/VR. While numerous clinical understudies analyze cadaver to become familiar
with the complexities of the human body, we at TUC are transitioning towards dissection into the
virtual reality world. Preserving bodies for long time can be expensive at times, and that is when
VR helps students for proper procedures and knowledge reinforcement. With just the hint of a
button, we can make the body move up and down or side to side or make it disappear or can strip
away the skin and the bones. This, of course, isn't real life. This is virtual reality. And it could soon change medical education in the United States.

Dr. Jim O’Connor, Director of the Center for Innovative Learning and Teaching, Western
Division, is helping develop TUC’s Immersive Technology Center to help train students in critical
procedures repeatedly in a controlled and safe manner. Ironically enough, it was as the world locked down in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that Dr. O’Connor saw the potential of Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) in an academic setting. Virtual reality has a lot of potential in the future, and we at TUC think a lot of schools are seeing that potential while some schools are ahead of the game and have successfully implemented it. Not only can students deconstruct a human body layer by layer, but certain programs let you immerse yourself inside those systems. For instance, students can literally immerse them into the lungs and can closely experience inhalation and exhalation process. If it’s a heart; students can immerse them into cardiac muscle contraction including the opening and closing of valves.

Dr. Natalie Nevins, an instructor with the College of Osteopathic Medicine and an officer in the
US Army is excited about the potential the technology promises. She’s a researcher with
VR/AR technology and has helped the military’s development of hyper realistic trauma training.
Severe combat injuries are often very unique and not something physicians experience on a
daily basis. Advanced VR technology allows doctors to train with these types of injuries without the need for injured service men and women. But the technology offers more than training that’s difficult to replicate in the real world. “You’re really only limited by your imagination,” Dr. Nevins said.

Not only TUC but also more established medical schools like University of Southern
California, University of Washington, Stanford school of medicine, and many more have VR
on their radar. We think it has a great purpose and a great value going forward. If there's
one clear use of virtual or augmented reality in medical school, it's in anatomy and
physiology.

Alok Modi, a third year College of Pharmacy student working with Dr O’Connor’s group, is
excited about what the technology has to offer students. “Being a member of an immersive
technology taskforce is a once in a lifetime opportunity to vision and implement
innovative things with different technologies on a daily basis,” Modi said. He pointed out
that similar technology is being employed to treat people with PTSD, for example, or to
help with pain reduction. “Some physicians and surgeons are using Meta-quest headsets to
distract pediatrics by putting on games and movies, so kids feel less pain and suffering
during surgeries and minor procedures,” he said.

At TUC, since we are in the early stages of developing an Immersive Technology Learning
Center (ITLC) on the TUC campus. We have recently purchased a significant amount of new
Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality equipment’s There are number of faculty, staff, and
students who came forward to serve on an Immersive Technology Taskforce in order to
provide guidance and direction for a better future into metaverse and develop our new
ITLC.