About Figment Learning Labs

Figment Learning Labs builds AI-powered virtual patients that give health professions students a safe place to practice the conversations at the heart of clinical care. Learners take histories, explain diagnoses, navigate pain and opioid management, work through a patient's ambivalence, and make decisions in real time with patients who respond like real people. Every encounter ends with structured feedback, so students can see what they did well and where to grow.

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Built by clinicians and educators

Figment was founded by Jeff Borckardt, PhD, a clinical psychologist, software developer, and health sciences professor with more than 130 publications in pain psychology, neuromodulation, and interprofessional education. The platform began with support from the National Institutes of Health through a Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, with additional support from the National Science Foundation I-Corps program and the South Carolina Research Authority.

 

Tested, not just promised

In a randomized controlled trial with students from medicine, nursing, dentistry, pharmacy, and allied health, learners who worked through Figment virtual patient cases showed significantly greater knowledge gains than peers who completed traditional written cases. They also answered applied case questions more accurately (79% vs. 64%) and rated the experience higher on engagement and real-world relevance. The study is published in JMIR Nursing (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT06624124).

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Made for the way faculty teach

Faculty can build their own cases in minutes and map them to the frameworks their programs answer to, including AACN Essentials, QSEN, IPEC, ACGME, ACOTE, and CAPTE. Figment runs in the browser and natively on iPad through Figment SimCare, which supports spoken conversation, on-device AI, and eye contact tracking while collecting no student identifiers.

Through Figment Commons, faculty can share their cases, request peer review, and receive a citable DOI at no cost, turning great teaching into recognized scholarship. Our Palmetto Faculty Innovators Program invites educators to partner with us, shape the platform's future, and help build the evidence base for simulation in health professions education.

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Our mission

We believe every future clinician deserves the chance to practice difficult conversations before they happen with real patients. Figment exists to make that practice realistic, accessible, and grounded in evidence.

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Figment Learning Labs is a brand of Palmetto Innovative Education LLC.