Teaching Methodology for the Training of a Laparoscopic Technique: Intestinal Anastomosis

Traditionally surgeons learned surgical techniques by training them directly in the patient by imitating the actions of the surgeon with more experience. Today this methodology is difficult to apply, since there are multiple factors that hinder its use. The limited time of training systems, scarcity of resources, patient safety or the need to learn new techniques of minimally invasive surgery, make the training of surgeons require a different learning methodology. This study has designed a new methodology for the learning of surgical techniques that minimizes the impact of all the previous factors on the training of surgeons. Its effectiveness in the teaching of laparoscopic manual intestinal anastomosis is analyzed. It has been asked a group of 24 expert surgeons teaching in intestinal anastomoses, which are the steps that must include the teaching of the technique. The phases evaluated with the highest score were included in the methodology. Once the steps of the methodology were designed, 25 general surgeons were chosen and divided into three groups according to their level of experience (experts, trained and beginners). Each participant performed five training sessions following the new methodology. The technical quality of the anastomosis, the overall development of the operation, as well as the feedback developed between the participants and the instructor was analyzed. After analyzing the results it was observed that structured feedback between the instructor and the participant increases the involvement of the participant in the learning process and reduces the time needed to acquire the competence. With this methodology the inexperienced participants perform the fifth anastomosis with quality parameters close to those obtained by the expert participants. In addition, this methodology allows to individualize the learning according to the needs of each participant. How to cite this paper: Ruiz-Gómez, J.L., Santiago, R.F., Useros, A.L., Redondo-Figuero, C. and Manuel-Palazuelos, J.C. (2017) Teaching Methodology for the Training of a Laparoscopic Technique: Intestinal Anastomosis. Surgical Science, 8, 384-401. https://doi.org/10.4236/ss.2017.88042 Received: June 26, 2017 Accepted: August 21, 2017 Published: August 24, 2017 Copyright © 2017 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY 4.0). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access J. L. Ruiz-Gómez et al. DOI: 10.4236/ss.2017.88042 385 Surgical Science