Evaluation of Surgical Simulator for Practicing a Vascular Anastomosis

Lawson Health Research Institute

Status

Completed

Conditions

Education, Medical

Treatments

Device: Surgical simulator to practice vascular anastomosis

Study type

Interventional

Funder types

Other

Identifiers

NCT00318279

11858E

R-05-826

Details and patient eligibility

About

To determine if practicing an aorto-saphenous vein anastomosis on a low-fidelity surgical simulator allows trainees to produce a higher quality anastomosis in a shorter period of time, than a group that only learns by watching a video.

Full description

For many years, surgical training has been considered an apprenticeship, where the training experiences of residents, have been in real operative settings on living patients. We propose a study to demonstrate that - a low-fidelity simulation of an aorta-proximal vein graft anastomosis as in heart bypass surgery, using anatomical replicates (a special hydrogel polymer with properties similar to human vascular tissue) - is an effective, low-cost simulator for learning this surgical skill, and will provide the trainee with the ability to perform a better anastomosis in a shorter period of time.

Hypothesis: Practicing an aorto-saphenous vein anastomosis on a low-fidelity surgical simulator will advance the trainees' learning curve. This will allow trainees to produce a higher quality anastomosis in a shorter period of time, than a group that only learns by watching a video and will lead to enhanced patient safety.

Enrollment

40 patients

Sex

All

Ages

18+ years old

Volunteers

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

1st year surgical resident at The University of Western Ontario
Anastomosis naive - the subject must not have performed a human vascular anastomosis in the past (it is acceptable if they have observed one being performed in the past)

Exclusion criteria