Comparing Hemorrhage in Human Physiology Simulation Tools: How They Compare with Expected Human Physiology and Each Other

Introduction Several different whole-body physiology simulation tools (PST) using modeling techniques are now available with potential use for healthcare simulation, but these novel technologies lack objective analysis from an independent organization. Methods We identified BioGears, HumMod, and Muse as 3 PSTs that met our requirements for testing. We ran mild, moderate, and severe hemorrhage scenarios on each PST and collected outputs for comparison with each other and published human physiology data. Results All PSTs tested followed the expected tachycardic and hypotensive response to hemorrhage for all levels of severity with variable qualitative patterns. Complete data for analysis were not available in all PSTs for urine output, stroke volume, blood volume, hemoglobin, and serum epinephrine concentration, but the partial findings are discussed in detail. We determined the predicted time to reach hemorrhage shock based on the hemorrhage guidelines and compared this with time to cardiovascular collapse from each PST. Overall, the differences from known human physiology were much larger than expected before testing and trends show HumMod with the smallest difference for severe (-6.25%) and moderate (-1.42%) and Muse with the smallest difference for mild hemorrhage (27.9%). BioGears demonstrated the largest differences in all classifications of severity. Conclusions Our analysis of currently available whole-body PSTs provides insight into the novel, evolving field. We hope our efforts shed light to a wider audience to the exciting developments and uses of mathematical modeling for whole-body simulation and the potential for integration into healthcare simulation for medical education.