Importance of moulage
Introduction
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Definition: (French: casting/moulding) is the art of applying mock injuries for the purpose of training Emergency Response Teams and other medical and military personnel (wikipedia)
A French word for “casting or molding” is the art of creating lifelike substances (injuries, wounds or fluids) to assist in providing shock desensitization, realism, and training techniques to simulation.
Moulage uses materials such as makeup to simulate clinical presentations. Moulage ranges in its complexity from simple wounds to prostheses with pumping blood.
Benefits
The benefits of using moulage for education of healthcare professionals:
- assists with the physical signs that support the diagnosis and subsequent management
- helps participants to engage; it brings emotional momentum
- provides clues to the patient’s condition/injuries
- helps supports decision making
- provides realistic training
- engages all the senses
- provides stress inoculation (prepares healthcare professionals for what to expect at the scene of the real world setting)
- enhances assessment (assessment is based on sensory experiences – what is felt, seen, heard and smelled, increased realism provides the missing link)
Different types of moulage:
- visual – whatever the wound/injury looks like in real life, make it look like it in simulation
- auditory – if it is loud in real life, make it loud in simulation
- olfactory – if it smells in real life, make it smell in simulation (bowel, maleana, vomitus, burn/smoke – if there is a burn, make it smell like there has been a fire)
- environment – ensure the simulated environment looks like it would in real life (clothes/ wigs / bedside equipment)
