Utility of a low-cost wireless force platform as a potential clinical test of balance recovery after neuraxial anaesthesia.

Introduction: Recovery of balance after neuraxial anaesthesia can remain delayed after simple clinical tests have demonstrated motor recovery. Dynamic posturography tracks the small movements or sway of a person standing as still as possible on a force platform and has been investigated as an objective measure of the ability to walk following anaesthesia. These are expensive laboratory devices, limiting their clinical utility.

A pilot study of the mental workload of objective structured clinical examination examiners.

Context: Mental workload is a concept used in many industries to investigate operator performance, but it has only recently been used in the educational setting. It has been suggested that excessive mental workload in assessors may impair the validity of objective structured clinical examination (OSCE)-type assessments.

Objectives: This study aimed to establish the feasibility of measuring the mental workload of examiners during an OSCE assessment and to establish methodologies and baseline values to guide future study design.

The relationship between experience and mental workload in anaesthetic practice: an observational study.

Mental workload is seen as a key factor in defining performance and expertise in some complex work environments, but there are no validated instruments for assessing mental workload in anaesthesia. We studied the mental workload of 20 anaesthetists of varying levels of experience, during five routine cases each, by measuring the delay in their responses to a frequently, but randomly, administered vibrotactile stimulus as a secondary task. We delivered, and recorded response times for, 6096 stimuli, with a median (range) of 55.