Expanding Experiential Education Through Simulated Patient Interactions

Lecturer Jessie Franco, OT, OTD, OTR, began working for the Department of Occupational Therapy at Sargent College in the spring of 2025. With a specialized background in acute care, Dr. Franco makes valuable contributions to the Neuroscience, Anatomy, Functional Movement, and Skills courses in the entry-level OTD program at Sargent. Dr. Franco is an experienced occupational therapist with practical knowledge in adult rehabilitation, especially in burns, upper extremity injuries, and neurology. During her time working as an OT at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, she observed the difficulties that many OT fieldwork students experience in navigating the transition from acute care skills in an academic setting to working with real patients. Dr. Franco then participated in developing an acute care elective at the MGH Institute for Health Professions, where she helped design a course that used simulation spaces for students’ learning as future OTs. Currently at Sargent, Dr. Franco values simulation-based learning and has advocated for integrating simulation experiences to help students gain practical skills they can use in acute care and physical rehabilitation settings in their professional futures.

Skills emphasized in BU’s state-of-the-art Simulation Lab include mobilizing patients with lines and leads, utilizing Hoyer lifts, and transferring more complex patients. In the Skills II course, students have the opportunity to gain more in-depth experience, as the course culminates in a final simulation-based practical before they begin their Level II fieldwork placements. The final practical also provides students with opportunities to develop documentation and chart-review skills. Dr. Franco was also a clinical instructor for the third course in the Integrative Seminar series, in which students participated in regular clinical interactions with simulated patients. Each simulated patient case involved a mental health component, which Dr. Franco believes is vital for students to understand, as they learn about how mental health can be involved in cases outside of traditional mental health settings. Her experience teaching EL-OTD students with the Simulation Lab as an instructional asset makes practice more realistic and allows for a natural scaffolding of support. Dr. Franco enjoys seeing students’ skills, confidence, and clinical reasoning develop as interactions in the Simulation Lab progress throughout the EL-OTD program.