By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
A new respiratory therapy program at Missouri Western State University will educate students to help fill a big need in the medical field.
Dean of the college of health and sciences Crystal Harris says there are many needs in the respiratory therapy field due to the pandemic, but there are also major needs in all healthcare fields.
"Just because of what we've been through with COVID and the job market is wide open and we have a regional need for all kinds of health care professions," Harris tells reporters. "This space is going to allow our students to really get hands-on learning."
Missouri Western will be opening an Interprofessional lab on campus in Murphy Hall.
Director of the Respiratory Therapy program David Northrop says this new lab will give students in all fields of medicine the chance to work alongside one another on simulated patients.
"So, respiratory therapy, nursing, and a physician, right, so, the three of them going into an interdisciplinary lab, able to simulate what is going on in a controlled, safe, non-patient care environment," Northrop explains. "The outcomes when you go take care of patients is going to be markedly improved."
Mosaic Life Care and the Mosaic Foundation recently gave 500-thousand dollars to Missouri Western to help fund the lab and the new program.
Northrop says the COVID-19 pandemic made healthcare workers essential.
"And there's still a huge job shortage with respiratory therapy," Northrop says. "So first off what it (the program) offers is we need to get students in, we need to get them educated, and we frankly need to get them out into the workforce to fill the void that is out there."
Northrop came to Missouri Western three months ago to help develop the respiratory program and develop the lab.