Learners put surgical training modules to the test

Competing surgical training modules are being assessed by learners and evaluators in countries around the world. The Global Surgical Training Challenge and Intuitive Foundation teams were privileged to witness the process in action. 

The learning modules under review were developed by the four finalist teams competing to win the Challenge, and include simulations and learning resources for hemorrhage control, local flap reconstructive surgery, tibial shaft fracture fixation and laparoscopic surgery for ectopic pregnancy.

Evaluations begin in Delhi

The site visits started in Delhi, India and included Intuitive Foundation’s president Dr Catherine Mohr, accompanied by Daniel Berman, director of global health for Challenge Works and Dr Adam Kushner, a surgeon consultant with deep experience in lower and middle income countries. This was an opportunity for the Challenge team to visit all the finalist teams, observe learners interacting with the modules, and to meet with evaluation partners.

“During our site visits, we hear first-hand from the learners,” says Dr Mohr. “It’s the first time we have had the opportunity to see in-person, real-world experiences with the modules and we look forward to seeing how the learners interact with them.”

The first stop was the Maulana Azad Medical College in Delhi, where their evaluation team is assessing the use of all four modules via direct and learner assessments. The evaluators were led by Prof. Pawanindra Lal, Dr Anurag Mishra and Dr Lovenish Bains.

“The learners have been very enthusiastic,” says Dr Bains. “We have had several sessions with at least 30 participants each.” The students are at all levels of their medical education, including interns and up to second-year postgraduate students.

How learners evaluate the modules

Before learners start the modules, they first participate in a workshop where they learn about the Global Surgical Training Challenge and its objectives. They are then assigned the modules they will test and are then left on their own. They must navigate the online interface and build their own simulators before practicing the techniques.

Students were asked to test the content and knowledge in the educational modules, including the simulators they built with instructions obtained on Appropedia, the open-source platform where the modules are hosted. 

“They get no help from the faculty or the teams,” adds Dr Bains. “We need to evaluate the entire process and they must do it on their own.” Throughout the process, the learners complete documents that evaluate specific elements of the modules.

Dr Bains added that while the focus is on evaluating the modules, they have been impressed at how much the students improve their surgical techniques each time they practice on the simulators.

The delegation from Intuitive Foundation and Challenge Works also made site visits to Nigeria, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Sudan, and Guatemala to meet with the finalists, learners and evaluators.