Clinical Skills Education and Evaluation Center

The Clinical Skills Education and Evaluation Center (CSEEC), established in 1963, is one of the oldest clinical teaching and assessment centers in the United States. The mission is to provide a rich simulation environment for training healthcare professionals of all levels to practice safe, effective, and compassionate clinical care.

Standardized Patients (SPs) were first introduced by Dr. Howard Barrows and Dr. Stephen Abrahamson at USC in 1963. USC is also a pioneer in simulation as Sim One, the first computer-controlled patient simulator was developed by Dr. Judson Denson and Dr. Stephen Abrahamson in 1969. Keck is a member of the California Consortium for the Assessment of Clinical Competence (CCACC). The consortium consists of clinicians and medical educators from nine California medical schools and is responsible for creating and conducting an annual Clinical Performance Examination (CPX) common to all member schools. The CPX is designed to assess clinical skills essential to the practice of medicine regardless of specialty.

About the CSEEC

The center is located on the second floor of the Seaver Building in a state-of-the-art facility that is consistent with the high-quality teaching and assessment performed by the program. The center is designed as a clinical environment with sixteen examination rooms for teaching and assessment of communication and clinical skills using SPs, task trainers and high-fidelity mannequins.

CSEEC conducts instruction and assessment in areas including history taking, performing a physical examination, developing critical thinking skills and formulating differential diagnoses, oral presentation of a clinical encounter, collaborating as a member of an interprofessional team, leading a patient handover to transition care, and obtaining informed consent from patients. The CSEEC is committed to instilling and enhancing the skills of resilience and problem solving in medical students.

Our Team

Alan Liu, MD
Associate Director of Clinical Skills Education

Kathryn Schaivone, EdD, MHA, CHSE
Assistant Director of Simulation and Clinical Skills Education

Moreen Logan, RN, EdD
Assistant Professor of Clinical Medical Education

Joy Cruz
Administrative Services Coordinator

Daniel Amparan
Office Technology Coordinator

For more information:
cseec@usc.edu