As he headed to UNMC Friday morning for a University of Nebraska Board of Regents’ meeting at the medical center, Chuck Hassebrook had no idea he would deliver his first baby that day.
Ok, so it wasn’t a real baby but rather a simulated infant that is part of the “Noelle” birthing simulator in the Sorrell Center’s Clinical Skills Lab.
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“If I ever get stuck in a elevator with a woman giving birth I would at least have a clue about what to do,” said Hassebrook, who helped pull calves when he was younger but said the simulated infant presented an altogether different challenge.
Cheered on by other regents, NU President James B. Milliken and UNMC Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D., and guided by family medicine’s David Harnisch, M.D., Hassebrook helped bring the plastic infant into the world … for the second time in five minutes; Dr. Harnish had demonstrated a delivery before Hassebrook took his turn.
Hassebrook’s first delivery came as part of day’s worth of events at UNMC for the regents.
While they toured campus Friday, they also:
- Received an update from Dr. Maurer on the campus’ strategic direction, health care reform’s potential impact on the campus and the financial risk profile for the campus going forward;
- Heard about new nursing education initiatives from College of Nursing Dean Virginia Tilden, D.N.Sc.;
- Visited with UNMC infectious diseases experts Steve Hinrichs, M.D., Ken Bayles, Ph.D., and Mark Rupp, M.D.;
- Participated in a panel discussion with several UNMC graduate students;
- Heard a presentation by Tony Hollingsworth, Ph.D., about UNMC’s latest efforts to fight pancreatic cancer;
- Talked with Cory Shaw of UNMC Physicians and Joe Graham of The Nebraska Medical Center about the medical center’s plans to confront health care reform; and
- Discussed cutting-edge vision research with Iqbal Ahmad, Ph.D., and Eyal Margalit, M.D.