Stryker and University Medical Center set up Amsterdam Skills Center
The aim of the center is to offer a faster and more effective training approach for medical professionals
On 4 February 2019 the new Amsterdam Skills Center for Health Sciences was officially opened. The new high-tech training facility enables medical professionals to learn and maintain expertise using the newest technologies and techniques.
The Amsterdam Skills Center (ASC) is a non-profit company owned by the Amsterdam University Medical Center. It has teamed up with Stryker, a global medical technology company with global headquarters in Kalamazoo (Michigan, USA), to set up the facility. Stryker has invested in building the 3,700 m2 center and has supplied the equipment.
The ASC is available for faculty from the Amsterdam University Medical Center, other universities in the Netherlands, and educational institutions worldwide.
A new way of learning
The aim of the center is to offer a faster and more effective training approach for medical professionals. On average, it takes more than 30,000 hours (circa 14 years) of learning and ‘training on the job’ before a novice is allowed to operate independently and lead a surgical team. This traditional approach can be replaced by high quality, time efficient and low cost ‘training off the job’ that uses state-of-the-art technology.
The new way of learning at the Amsterdam center will use digital resources varying from e-books to virtual reality training with haptic feedback, feasibility of tele-mentoring, the advances of artificial intelligence allowing decision support and image guidance, and the availability of novel techniques to preserve human tissue.
State of the art operating theater
The center features a state of the art operating theater with 12 operating tables for training complex procedures, featuring surgical robots, virtual reality simulators, and video animations of interventions. In addition to Stryker, the ASC is teaming up with Digital Surgery (develops interactive virtual reality animations of surgical and medical interventions), MOOG (develops medical virtual reality simulators for dentistry and cataract surgery) and Incision (develops video animations of surgical procedures).
As well as enabling upcoming surgeons to master new skills, the center will also help experienced professionals to maintain their abilities through a lifelong learning cycle. Furthermore, the ASC will provide ‘teach the teacher’ courses to stimulate knowledge sharing.
Invest in Holland and Life Sciences & Health
The Invest in Holland network is a collaborative team of the Netherlands Foreign Investment Agency (NFIA), regional economic development agencies, several large cities and Holland International Distribution Council (HIDC). The network works to provide a continuum of free, confidential support services to new foreign investors, as well as existing foreign investors that already have operations in the Netherlands. The network established a dedicated team to support companies that are interested to be part of the growing Life Sciences & Health (LSH) cluster in the Netherlands.
Source: Amsterdam Skills Center
5 February 2019