SPAL Staff

Julie Askren, R.N., SPAL Director

Deb Jones , B.A., Standardized Patient Trainer

Janet Trentmann, B.S., Standardized Patient Trainer

Deb Gordley, Administrative Secretary

The staff of the Standardized Performance Assessment Lab are members of the Association of Standardized Patient Educators.

SPAL is located on the ground floor of Ryan Hall
3200 Grand Avenue Des Moines, Iowa 

SPAL Primary Objectives

• To provide a realistic examination setting to help medical students enhance communication and diagnostic reasoning skills before working with patients in clinical settings.
• To provide an opportunity for faculty to assess and evaluate students’ skills in testing situations.  

SPAL Goals:

• To serve as a standardized teaching and evaluation tool for students and faculty.
• To encourage improvement of students’ clinical skills by critiquing their own performances via video downloaded to their computer.
• To assist the faculty in the administration of realistic clinical encounters with the use of standardized patients.
• To assist the faculty in identifying the desired level of clinical objectives. 
• To assist the faculty in defining the clinical tasks at which students are expected to be competent.
• To assist faculty in standardizing teaching, evaluation, and feedback techniques based on the use of standardized patients.
• To provide a mechanism for demonstrating achievement of curricular clinical outcome.

How has SPAL Benefited Health Professions Education?

Here is what students have to say:

I greatly appreciate this experience. My skills were definitely enhanced, and I am confident they will be helpful in the clinical years. I do not know of any other experience that would have better prepared me for the next two years. The SPAL lab is one of the most valuable pieces of my medical education. It allowed me to put into practice the things I have read in texts and seen in shadowing experiences. Thank you so much for all of your hard work.

I am completely satisfied with the quality of this program and how it has prepared me for rotations. This is a model to all physical diagnosis programs. Thank you to all those who made this experience possible. Excellent learning tool. I hope this will be carried on into the future.