Technical mentorship during robot‐assisted surgery: a cognitive analysis

Abstract

This study objectively evaluated the cognitive engagement of a surgical mentor teaching technical skills during surgery. The study provides a deeper understanding of how surgical teaching actually works and opens new horizons for assessment and teaching of surgery. Further research is needed to study the feasibility of this novel concept in assessment and guidance of surgical performance.

Variability and interpretation of communication taxonomy during robot‐assisted surgery: do we all speak the same language?

“…Communication in RAS is challenging because of the congestion of equipment and the altered operating theatre dynamics, with isolation of the surgeon on the console away from the patient and the bedside assistants [4,5,7,26]. The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality recommended against the use of non-verbal communication because of its Acknowledgement P = 0.02 Fig.…”

Dynamic changes of brain functional states during surgical skill acquisition

“…Results showed that performance level decreased (FSRS metrics increased) by increase of difficulty level. Our previous studies showed that NASA-TLX scores given by trainee are not reliable for expertise level assessment as we could not find any significant correlation between individual NASA-TLX metrics and expertise level (assessed by expert RAS surgeons) [ 20 , 29 ], maybe because trainee doesn’t have enough proficiency to consider all necessary factors in evaluation [ 6 , 20 , 29 ].…”

“…The results in Table 4 may suggest that although scores given to individual NASA-TLX are not reliable for expertise level assessment [ 6 , 20 , 29 ], difficulty level feature (calculated by using some of these metrics) can be an informative feature toward performance evaluation during RAS skill acquisition.…”

Multimodal Physiological Signals for Workload Prediction in Robot-assisted Surgery

“…EEG signals were also used to identify cognition patterns of a surgical mentor and trainee when teaching RAS skills. It was found that the mentor's workload increased when the trainee's workload decreased [8].…”

“…Some potential of assistive strategies that will be enabled with cognitive load sensing include using virtual fixtures to prevent risky motions [2], removing unintentional hand tremors [3], taking over simple and repetitive subtasks [4], and providing augmented reality cues about future steps [5]. Providing intraoperative workload feedback would also accelerate surgeon training programs [6,7] by customizing training according to individual stress profiles and focusing on the specific task demands that are associated with high cognitive load [8].…”