Improving Surgical Techniques: Use of Surgical Procedures Videos as Learning Tools - A Multicentric Study

Abstract

Objective: To assess utilization of online surgical videos among general surgery residents and consultants. Study Design: Prospective longitudinal study. Place and Duration of Study: Twelve Teaching Hospitals, from across Pakistan, from Jan to Jun 2022. Methodology: Structured questionnaire was formulated after literature review/discussions and was vetted by experts. After pilot study it was distributed to 60 surgery residents and consultants, who were actively involved in patient care, out of which 45 participated in the study (35 residents and 10 consultants). Results: Surgical videos were utilized by 33 residents (94%) and 10 consultants (100%) for learning purpose (p=0.439). YouTube was the most common source (42 participants, 97.7%). Parameters for finding desired videos included relevance to search query (27 participants, 62.8%), length (16 participants, 37.2%) and resolution (15 participants, 34.9%), which actually have little role in determining quality. Moreover, 19 participants (44.2%) did not look for peer reviewed videos (p=0.673). Conclusion: Although surgical videos have become useful adjunct to learning general surgery, care must be taken regarding unregularized, non-standardized content. High quality, peer reviewed content should be sought.

Keywords

• Medical education, Surgery, Video-based learning.