Application of an Optical Tracking System for Motor Skill Assessment in Laparoscopic Surgery.

Objective: Motion analysis of surgical instruments can be used to evaluate laparoscopic surgical skills, and this study assessed the validity of an optical tracking system for the assessment of laparoscopic surgical motor skills.

Methods: Ten experienced surgeons and ten novices were recruited to complete the transferring tasks on a laparoscopic simulator. An optical tracking system, Micron Tracker, was used to capture the marker points on each instrument and to obtain the coordinates of the marker points and the corresponding instrument tip coordinates. The data are processed to create a coordinate system based on the laparoscopic simulator and to calculate the movement parameters of the instruments, such as operating time, path length, speed, acceleration, and smoothness. At the same time, the range of motion of the instrument (insertion depth and pivoting angle) is also calculated.

Results: The position that the tip of the instrument can reach is a small, irregularly shaped spatial area. Significant differences ( < 0.05) were found between the surgeon and novice groups in parameters such as operating time, path length, mean speed, mean acceleration, and mean smoothness. The range of insertion depth of the instruments was approximately 150 mm to 240 mm, and the pivoting angles of the left and right instruments were 30.9° and 46.6° up and down and 28.0° and 35.0° left and right, respectively.

Conclusions: The optical tracking system was effective in subjectively evaluating laparoscopic surgical skills, with significant differences between the surgeon and novice groups in terms of movement parameters, but not in terms of range of motion.