East Hospital opens Latvia’s first hospital-based Simulation Centre

On 29 July, the Riga East University Hospital (East Hospital) opened a Simulation Centre – the first hospital-based facility of this kind in Latvia. It will allow healthcare professionals to enhance their practical skills, train for complex clinical situations, and learn new treatment methods and technologies in a hospital setting, alongside their everyday work.

The greatest beneficiary of such training is the patient, as a professionally prepared medical team is able to provide safer, better, and more efficient treatment. Meanwhile, for healthcare professionals this means a safe, stress-free environment where they are able to enhance their practical skills, reflect on their actions, and improve teamwork, without any risk to patients.

At the opening ceremony of the Simulation Centre, the Minister for Health, Houssam Abou Merhi, emphasized: “Latvia’s university hospitals are at the forefront of healthcare, education, research, and innovation, and we are committed to strengthening their role as centres of excellence. The establishment of the Simulation Centre at the East Hospital represents a bold and ambitious step towards a modern environment for professional development, which will strengthen the Hospital’s ability to provide high-quality continuing education, foster the exchange of knowledge, and introduce the latest medical technologies. It is a centre where healthcare professionals are able to enhance their practical skills and teamwork and prepare for complex clinical situations in a safe environment. Investments like this improve patient safety and quality of healthcare, specifically, they allow healthcare professionals to provide better care and deliver better treatment outcomes for patients.”

The Simulation Centre has been set up as a training facility that closely replicates the hospital setting and includes an intensive care and anaesthesiology unit, a control room, and a simulation analysis room. The equipment includes simulation manikins and technologies that allow to recreate even complex clinical situations and various changes in a patient’s health condition. Connected to a computer system, the manikins allowing instructors to modify vital signs, skin colour, responses, and other parameters during the simulation, thereby creating conditions that closely resemble a real clinical situation.

After each simulation, participants analyse their actions, communication, and decisions together with the instructor. Such structured simulation analysis allows to strengthen practical skills and enhance teamwork. Simulations will be conducted by specially trained instructors which include East Hospital’s staff with practical and educational experience.

“Our Hospital regularly encounters highly complex clinical situations, where success heavily depends on healthcare professionals acting accurately and as one team. A university hospital’s greatest strength does not lie in the assumption that it already has all the answers, but its commitment to continuous learning. While patients may never witness the operation or procedure itself, they experience the quality of the team’s collaboration, which is why simulation training develops not only practical skills, but also communication, mutual trust, and the ability to make sound decisions in high-pressure situations,” explained Vadims Beļuns, Chairman of the Board.

The Simulation Centre will offer hands-on training programmes for physicians, nurses, nursing assistants, healthcare support staff, and other professionals, based on the Hospital’s healthcare needs. In the future, its facilities may also be made available for the professional development of healthcare professionals from other institutions, as well as for practical training of patients and their relatives in specific healthcare situations.

The infrastructure and technical facilities of the Simulation Centre were developed under the RRF Project No. 4.2.1.1.i.0/1/24/I/VM/008 “Development of a Simulation-based Training Approach at the Riga East University Hospital”, and the actual costs amount to nearly EUR 600,000, including the adaptation of rooms, procurement of simulation equipment, and introduction of technological solutions required for hands-on training. The Simulation Centre is located at the Gaiļezers facility of the East Hospital, at Hipokrāta iela 2 in Riga.

About the East Hospital’s Training Centre

The East Hospital’s Training Centre is the largest professional development centre for healthcare professionals among Latvia’s university hospitals. Over 300 continuing education and professional development activities are organised at the Centre each year, allowing more than 13,000 healthcare professionals to enhance their knowledge and practical skills. The Simulation Centre represents a significant addition to the Training Centre’s infrastructure, providing new opportunities to develop practical competencies among healthcare professionals and enhance patient safety.

About the East Hospital 

Riga East University Hospital is the largest and strategically significant multi-profile hospital in the country. The hospital consists of five inpatient facilities – Gaiļezers, Latvian Oncology Centre, Biķernieki, Tuberculosis and Lung Disease Centre, and Latvian Infectious Diseases Centre, along with various specialised centres and clinics. The hospital provides highly specialised inpatient and secondary outpatient healthcare, offering multidisciplinary tertiary-level treatment and care in line with modern technology and medical knowledge. Approximately 80% of all cancer patients in Latvia are treated at the hospital. It serves as a practical training base for both Latvian educational institutions and foreign students, providing further education and knowledge transfer to healthcare specialists within and beyond the country. The hospital engages in scientific research and develops innovative methods for patient treatment. As the third-largest employer in the country, the hospital employs around 5000 staff members.