Instructors at Ridgewater College in Willmar, MN, are hoping parmesan cheese and lemon juice are two ingredients that will cook up many successful nursing careers.

According to StarTribune.com, mixed together, the two create “vomit” in one of the many graphic simulation exercises in the college’s nursing program, which aims to expose students to the real-life aspects of patient care. Practicing the art of “moulage,” a French term meaning “to form,” instructors Karen Haarris and Jeanne Cleary use this concoction and others to add authenticity to simulation labs where mock injuries and illnesses happen to life-size mannequins. The simulation is also used to prepare students for disasters and other emergency medical situations.

Other food items used to simulate patient conditions include cherry pie filling to represent postpartum blood clots, salsa to simulate gastrointestinal bleeding, and a licorice stick placed under a mannequin’s skin to imitate a distended neck vein. Other recipes used for simulation exercises can be found in Haarris and Cleary’s cookbook, Moulage for Manikins!

 Do you think simulation exercises such as these are effective in preparing students for the nursing field?