Objective assessment in residency-based training for transoral robotic surgery.

Objectives/hypothesis: To develop a robotic surgery training regimen integrating objective skill assessment for otolaryngology and head and neck surgery trainees consisting of training modules of increasing complexity leading up to procedure-specific training. In particular, we investigated applications of such a training approach for surgical extirpation of oropharyngeal tumors via a transoral approach using the da Vinci robotic system.

Study Design: Prospective blinded data collection and objective evaluation (Objective Structured Assessment of Technical Skills [OSATS]) of three distinct phases using the da Vinci robotic surgical system in an academic university medical engineering/computer science laboratory setting.

A robotic assistant for trans-oral surgery: the robotic endo-laryngeal flexible (Robo-ELF) scope.

This paper describes the continued development of the Robotic EndoLaryngeal (Robo-ELF) Scope System, a simple clinically usable robot for manipulating flexible endoscopes, particularly in laryngeal surgery. The system includes a robot with three active and two passive degrees of freedom, a five degree of freedom passive positioning arm, a malleable scope shaft support, and a custom joystick controller. The Robo-ELF Scope allows a surgeon to control a flexible endoscope with only one hand and also to release the controls and perform bimanual surgery if desired.

Robotic endolaryngeal flexible (Robo-ELF) scope: a preclinical feasibility study.

Objectives/hypothesis: This article presents a novel robotic endolaryngeal flexible (Robo-ELF) scope driver for minimally invasive laryngeal surgery. The Robo-ELF consists of a simple, robust robotic scope driver with three active and two passive degrees of freedom, allowing it to manipulate any standard flexible endoscope. The system is controlled by a joystick-like three dimensional mouse that interfaces with the scope driver via a laptop.

Icon identification in context: the changing role of icon characteristics with user experience.

Objective: This research examined the relative importance of icon characteristics in determining the speed and accuracy of icon identification.

Background: Studies to date have focused on the role of one or two icon characteristics when users first experience an icon set. This means that little is known about the relative importance of icon characteristics or how the role of icon characteristics might change as users gain experience with icons.