Surgery simulators let medical students experience the adrenaline rush of a real operating room in a way that practicing on a cadaver cannot. Blood and guts aren't new to gaming, and simulators aren't new to training. But when the game is played on the human body, it offers exciting new opportunities for medical students to perfect their hand skills before they ever see their first patient. At the Center for Immersive and Simulation-based Learning at Stanford, the lowest-performing students in a surgery simulator outperformed the highest-ranked students trained by traditional means. In this panel, we will briefly look at the history of simulation training, explore some simulator interfaces, experience a demonstration of a surgery simulator, and allow (at least) one lucky audience member to put his or her hand on the virtual knife. Panelists will discuss how what we traditionally think of as a game environment can be used to dramatically improve the training surgeons receive, change how surgeons receive accreditation—and ultimately improve their performance in practice.
http://schedule.sxsw.com/events/event_IAP7236
