This year, Clinical Congress offers surgeons two opportunities in the Exhibit Hall to participate in hands-on simulation laboratories: the Surgical Metrics Project and Surgical Ergonomics Clinic. Both projects—open from 9:00 am to 4:30 pm, Monday, October 23, through Wednesday, October 25—combine practical help to individual surgeons with research efforts and a potential to transform surgery for the better.
The Surgical Metrics Project invites surgeons to participate in simulated surgeries while wearing sensors on their fingers (to record hand motions) and forehead (to record EEG data). Project leader Carla M. Pugh, MD, PhD, FACS, explained, “One of the first goals is to build a database of what practitioners do in the operating room. What operative decisions do you make and why?”
This database offers rare access to objective insights into individual surgeons’ mastery of specific surgical tasks. Participants will have the opportunity to review data on their individual performances. “It enables surgeons to have an objective digital measure of where they are and where they should be, so they know exactly where they are on the learning curve to mastery,” Dr. Pugh said.
The Surgical Ergonomics Clinic will offer surgical stations simulating open, laparoscopic, and robotic OR environments to show surgeons how best to stand, move, and collaborate with teammates to maximize efficiency and maintain musculoskeletal health. Participants will be able to try out adjustable OR components and receive personalized feedback on body positioning, movement, sightlines, and other issues from ergonomics coaches.
Organizer Gyusung Lee, PhD, said, “What we really want to do is not just try to help the surgeons who are already experiencing physical symptoms or complications from ergonomically incorrect operating, but we want to prevent or at least delay the onset of such problems even for the younger surgeons.”
The independent projects share several traits. In addition to offering practical help, both will invite attendees to participate in research. The Surgical Metrics Project will ask attendees to complete surveys on their surgical discipline, experience level, and familiarity with the surgery simulated onsite and will incorporate these data into nuanced benchmarks of surgical skills. The Surgical Ergonomics Clinic will ask surgeons to fill out a survey onsite and three surveys over the next 9 months on ergonomic changes they’ve made and their impact on ergonomic symptoms.
The projects also aim to expand their influence. For the Surgical Metrics Project, connections to the College of Surgeons of East, Central and Southern Africa and other partners will aid the development of lower-cost simulations for clinicians in low- and middle-income countries. The Surgical Ergonomics Clinic will use collected data to offer ergonomics insights to ACS-affiliated simulation centers and urge industry partners to create surgical instruments suitable for surgeons of any height, strength, and body size.
Taken to scale, the projects may challenge the culture of surgery. Dr. Pugh noted that objective, data-driven feedback on surgical skills may circumvent “bias in human observation and feedback;” Dr. Lee said that ergonomic changes can require ignoring hierarchies in favor of addressing physical needs: “The one item I really talk about is the change of culture.”
Both welcome participants who have visited earlier iterations of either project at previous Clinical Congresses. Dr. Lee said, “We encourage them to come back together and learn again.”
Participants should expect to spend roughly 20 minutes at each hands-on simulation laboratory, and no appointments are necessary.
