By Billy Reardon ‘23

This past week, the Crusaders and the Mighty Macs finished a dual-credit nursing course at Saint Xavier University. The course is offered during the fall and spring semesters and is limited in capacity. Students who take the class experience hands-on simulations with different patients, learn how to take blood pressure, and learn how to take vital signs. I enjoyed the class as I will be going into the medical field as a career.

My brother is going to be a nurse anesthetist and my dad is a paramedic. Seeing what they do, the medical field excites me. The machines, medicines, and severe cases always catch my eye and give me the urge to help that person.

I walked into the classroom, seeing all the simulation labs and IVs, and I thought to myself this is pretty cool! Right off the bat, we learned how to put on scrubs and how to take off gloves properly. Now, these scrubs weren’t the $200 scrubs that we see in “Grey’s Anatomy,” but it was super cool putting on scrubs! I would highly recommend taking this class because it is super exciting, and it is hands-on learning.

The simulation lab was the best part of the course because you could feel the dummy’s pulse and it could even bleed and throw up. I listened to it breath and could determine what illness it had, and I diagnosed it with pneumonia. Then we took the blood pressure of each student who was in the class and recorded everyone’s vitals.

“It’s a nice way to meet the staff at SXU and not just learn about nursing, but what the college classes would be like,” said senior Danny Boss.