ORLANDO, FL (UroToday.com) - The development of realistic simulators for various minimally invasive surgery techniques may potentially provide comprehensive training, a method to maintain surgical skills, and evaluation and certification of surgical competence.

Dr. Matsuda reported the correlation of videotape scores (VS) of actual surgical procedures, as assessed by the Endoscopic Surgical Skill Qualification (ESSQ) System to motion analysis data on the LapMentor system, a virtual reality laparoscopic surgical simulator. There were a total of 43 physicians enrolled in the study with a laparoscopic experience of 20-79 cases. The ESSQ system qualified 26 surgeons (Group Q) whereas 17 surgeons did not qualify (Group NQ). The age, years of experience and number of laparoscopic surgeries between the 2 groups did not show a statistical difference. The analysis of motion scores based on skill task 5 (application of clips) and skill task 8 (cutting of bands) correlated with VS scores. Group Q achieved higher scores than Group NQ.

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