Creation and validation of a novel low-cost dry lab for early resident training and assessment of robotic prostatectomy technical proficiency

Abstract

Purpose: To evaluate the preliminary validity and acceptability of a low-cost low-fidelity robotic surgery dry lab for training and assessing residents’ technical proficiency with key robotic radical prostatectomy steps.

Materials and methods: Three standardized inanimate tasks were created to simulate the radical prostatectomy steps of posterior dissection, neurovascular bundle release, and urethrovesical anastomosis. Urology trainees and faculty at a single institution completed and evaluated each dry lab task. Construct validity was evaluated by comparing task completion times and Global Evaluative Assessment of Robotic Skills scores across four participant cohorts: medical students (n = 5), junior residents (n = 5), senior residents (n = 5), and attending surgeons (n = 7). Content validity, face validity, and acceptability were evaluated through a posttask survey using a 5-point Likert scale.

Results: There was a significant difference in the individual and composite task completion times and Global Evaluative Assessment of Robotic Skills scores across all participant cohorts (all p < 0.01). The model was rated favorably in terms of its content validity and acceptability for use in residency training. However, model realism, compared with human tissue, was poorly rated. The dry lab production cost was less than US $25.

Conclusions: This low-cost procedure-specific dry lab demonstrated evidence of content validity, construct validity, and acceptability for simulating key robotic prostatectomy technical steps and can be used to augment robot-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy surgical training.

Keywords

Robotic surgery education / Radical prostatectomy / Simulation / Dry laboratory / Validation

Author summay

Supplemental Digital Content is available for this article.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank the UCLA Department of Urology for its support, and the UCLA medical students, residents, and faculty who took time to participate in the dry lab and provided feedback.

Statement of ethics

This study was evaluated by the Research Ethics Board of UCLA and was exempted from a formal IRB review (IRB#20-001803). Subject participation was voluntary and verbal consent was obtained. All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Funding source

None.

Author contributions

WB: Conceived the idea and supervised the project, along with RR;

AV, KK, KF, JB, JK: Carried out the dry labmodel, collected the data, and performed the analyses;

AV: Wrote the manuscript with input and critical feedback from all the authors.

Data availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available, but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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