Training to maintain surgical skills during periods of robotic surgery inactivity.

Guseila, Loredana M; Saranathan, Archana; Jenison, Eric L; Gil, Karen M; Elias, John J

BACKGROUND The study was performed to establish a level of practice needed for newly-trained residents to maintain robotic surgical skills during periods of robotic inactivity. METHODS Ten surgical residents were trained to a standardized level of robotic surgery proficiency with inanimate models. At the end of two, four and six weeks, the residents practiced with the models for a total of one hour. Each resident performed a timed tissue closure task immediately after reaching the proficiency standards and twice in succession at eight weeks. Time to completion was compared between the three trials with a repeated measures ANOVA and a post-hoc test. RESULTS Average time to complete the tissue closure task decreased by more than 25% over the period between reaching the proficiency standards and the trials at eight weeks, with the difference significant (P < 0.004). CONCLUSIONS Biweekly practice for one hour was sufficient to maintain robotic surgical skills.