Simulating Medical Patients and Practices: Bodies and the Construction of Valid Medical Simulators

Why and how can a gynaecological simulator that has been ‘validated’ in one context, that is, accepted by experts as a functional and realistic model of the body on which to teach gynaecological exams, not be considered functional when it changes contexts and is used in another country? 1 To think through this problem, which grew out of reflections upon the ontological basis of the simulator’s different functionality within the US and Swedish contexts, I examine the use of the terms ‘reality’ and ‘validity’ in medical simulator literature, and then apply Karen Barad’s concepts of agential reality and intra-action to the gynaecological simulator’s development. This provides a new way of thinking about how knowledge can be created in and from a simulator.