- Email: [email protected]
Lights, camera, surgery: a novel pilot project to engage medical students in the development of pediatric surgical learning resources
Journal of Pediatric Surgery (2011) 46, 962–965
www.elsevier.com/locate/jpedsurg
Lights, camera, surgery: a novel pilot project to engage medical students in the development of pediatric surgical learning resources Kelvin Kwan, Christopher Wu, Damian Duffy, John Masterson, Geoffrey K. Blair ⁎ The Department of Pediatric Surgery, British Columbia Children's Hospital, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6H 3V4 Received 7 February 2011; accepted 11 February 2011
Key words: Video; Online resource; Medical student; Surgical education
Abstract Background/Purpose: It is important to engage junior medical students in the pediatric surgical environment to showcase possible future career choices. Our aim was to assess how the students valued their experience in the realm of clinical learning, exposure to surgical careers, and development of skill sets necessary for creating learning resources. Methods: A novel pilot project entitled Lights, Camera, Surgery engaged 13 medical students in the production of instructional videos of basic surgical procedures. An electronic survey questionnaire allowed the students to provide formal feedback on the project outcomes. Results: Of the students who responded, 87.5% expressed appreciation of the enhanced clinical experience. All of the students either agreed or strongly agreed that the project afforded them valuable leadership experience, practical skills in creating educational learning resources, and opportunities to explore careers in surgery. All of the students either agreed or strongly agreed that the project allowed them to gain valuable skills in educational video production. The project videos are now available as educational tools. Conclusions: Engaging medical students in the production of surgical videos potentially improves leadership skills and promotes the use of educational resources while affording them opportunities to explore pediatric surgery as a future career choice. © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Distributed medical education has led to a necessary increase in the use of new learning resources to bridge multiple satellite campuses to their main campus. For instance, in the autumn of 2011, the University of British
⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 (604)875-2706; fax: +1 (604)875 2721. E-mail address: [email protected] (G.K. Blair). 0022-3468/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jpedsurg.2011.02.029
Columbia (UBC) Faculty of Medicine will launch the South Medical program, which will be the fourth satellite campus in UBC's MD undergraduate program. Aside from UBC, other Canadian universities have also launched distributed medical education programs. There are currently 11 satellite campuses across Canada in which more than 250 medical students will graduate from each year [1]. Many of these students may have potential interest in pediatric surgery as a future career choice, but how can we best expose them early
Lights, camera, surgery: novel pilot project to engage students to the opportunities of a pediatric surgical career in the context of satellite campus training that may be far from pediatric surgical centers? Our UBC Department of Pediatric Surgery was particularly interested in ways that would engage junior medical students in the pediatric surgical environment to showcase possible future career choices. In 2009, the department of pediatric surgery, with funding from the UBC Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund, initiated a pilot project entitled Lights, Camera, Surgery, and as of the summer of 2010, the project is currently running in its second year. The purpose of this project was for medical students to participate in the design and production of instructional videos for teaching basic surgical procedures. These instructional videos would broaden access to clinical learning resources and opportunities for medical students regardless of their geographic campus location. A major goal of Lights, Camera, Surgery was to foster an early interest among students in the surgical disciplines by promoting participation early in preclinical training. In addition, the project aimed to assess how the students valued their experience in the realm of clinical learning, exposure to surgical careers, and the development of skill sets necessary for creating learning resources.
1. Methods
963
assess whether the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery engaged student authors in the development of pediatric surgical learning resources and allowed them to (1) broaden access to clinical learning resources, (2) explore careers within the surgical environment, (3) develop skill sets necessary for creating online resources, and (4) ignite their leadership in creating clinical learning resources. The survey used a 5-step Likert scale (strongly disagree, disagree, neutral, agree, or strongly agree) as well as comment boxes for the student authors to list strengths of the project, areas needing improvement, and how this project had influenced their career path.
2. Results 2.1. Instructional videos In 2009, the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery created 19 instructional videos within the categories of anesthesiology, general surgery, plastic surgery, safety/procedural, and urology (Table 1). The instructional videos varied in length from 3 to 12 minutes, with an average length of 6 minutes. A still of an instructional video outlining the excision of a skin lesion is shown in Fig. 1. The project videos are now available on a secure, password-protected site at UBC as learning resources.
1.1. Creation of surgical instructional videos In 2009, 13 medical students in first or second year of the 4-year UBC MD undergraduate program, placed in teams of 2 or 3, were given 19 key surgical procedures selected by surgical faculty who acted as mentors. These student authors were given leadership roles in storyboarding, film production, and learning how to film within the surgical setting. A professional videographer coached the student authors on storyboarding and filming, whereas the surgical mentor worked with the student authors on the key concepts of the surgical procedure. The student authors obtained media consent for filming in the operating room from the hospital, staff, and patients or parents of the patients. All completed instructional videos were to be uploaded on a secure, password-protected site at UBC, accessible only to medical students, staff, and faculty for learning purposes. In 2010, 10 students were given 30 procedures using the aforementioned methods.
1.2. Assessing how the student authors valued their experience At the end of the pilot project in 2009, an electronic survey questionnaire allowed the student authors to provide formal feedback on the project outcomes. This survey was considered completely optional. The survey was used to
Table 1 Instructional videos completed by the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery in 2009 Video title
Video category
Intubation Intravenous Insertion Venous Access Device Insertion Nasogastric Tube Insertion Fine Needle Aspiration Thyroid Biopsy Atrial Septal Defect Repair Thoracoscopy Excisional Biopsy Needlestick Injury Closed Gowning and Gloving Technique Open Gowning and Gloving Technique Flexible Diagnostic Cystoscopy Pyeloplasty Pediatric Circumcision Suprapubic Catheterization Robotic Prostatectomy Ureteroscopy Varicocele Repair Female Catheterization
Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric
anesthesiology anesthesiology general surgery general surgery general surgery
Pediatric cardiac Surgery Pediatric general surgery Pediatric plastic surgery Surgical safety/procedural Surgical safety/procedural Surgical safety/procedural Urology Pediatric urology Pediatric urology Pediatric urology Urology Urology Urology Urology
964
Fig. 1 A still of an instructional video outlining the excision of a skin lesion entitled Excisional Biopsy.
2.2. Costs of instructional videos In 2009, the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery received Can $22,350 in funding. This funding served to pay the junior students' summer employment wages as well as all costs associated with video production. The creation of 19 instructional videos resulted in each video costing an average of Can $1176, including the student wages. However, it is important to note the one-time investment for the video camera, laptop, and editing software. The cost of videos produced in 2010 was estimated to be closer to Can $800.
2.3. Student author survey Eight of 13 surveyed student authors responded. Of the student authors who responded, none of them had previous experience with filming, storyboarding, editing, or producing learning resources. Seven (87.5%) had an opportunity to gain clinical experience in the operating room throughout the project.
K. Kwan et al. In brief, the survey results found that 87.5% of the student authors who responded expressed appreciation for the enhanced clinical experience, particularly recognizing that for many of the medical students, this was their first experience in an operating room. All the student authors either agreed or strongly agreed that the project afforded them valuable leadership experience, practical skills in creating educational learning resources, and opportunities to explore careers in surgery. All of the student authors either agreed or strongly agreed that the project allowed them to gain valuable skills in educational video production including video filming and video editing. A full summary of the survey is shown in Fig. 2. The written feedback portions of the survey from the student authors were mostly positive. The general theme revolved around how the project allowed them to explore surgery earlier in their medical education and how the project helped them in their consideration of surgery as a career.
3. Discussion We believe that the Lights, Camera, Surgery project served as an ideal forum for our junior medical students to link with staff mentors in pediatric surgery, as well as some mentors in nonpediatric surgery and pediatric anesthesia. It gave them exposure to clinical surgery with a purpose as opposed to just passively observing operations and perhaps being “pimped” by a well-meaning but possibly intimidating staff surgeon [2]. The electronic survey, by which means we collected the student's opinions about the project and their experience, did have a suboptimal return rate. However, it was completely voluntary and was undertaken after their summer engagement with Lights, Camera, Surgery had finished and they were deep into their second- or third-year curriculum. Of those who did respond, their reports were, on the whole, very positive, but it will be important that, after our next iteration of the project in 2010, the survey be more rigorous and that it include the responses of the mentors as well. The overall, generally positive perception of the project and its novelty in the way it allowed for purposeful engagement of the junior medical students in our discipline, we believe, justified this report.
3.1. Expansion of Lights, Camera, Surgery
Fig. 2 A summary of the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery student author survey in 2009. On the 5-step Likert scale, “neutral,” “agree,” and “strongly agree” are proportionately represented by white, gray, and black bars, respectively. There were no responses of “strongly disagree” or “disagree.” The numbers inside the bars represent the percentage of the respective response by the student authors.
The success and enthusiasm of the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery in 2009 led to the continuation and expansion of the project in 2010 to include more disciplines related to surgery. This has opened 2 new partnerships: one with the UBC Palliative Care department, and the other with the British Columbia Patient Safety and Quality Council. Furthermore, the Lights, Camera, Surgery project in 2010 included the addition of cardiac and orthopedic surgeries
Lights, camera, surgery: novel pilot project to engage students instructional videos. The end of the project anticipates 30 additional instructional videos in 2010. It is important to consider the quality of the videos produced. Medical students in the UBC MD undergraduate program preferred quality rather than the local availability of resources [3]. Therefore, if a surgical procedure was not common, students at any campus of the UBC MD undergraduate program could observe these instructional videos. As indicated in Fig. 1, these instructional videos were clear and in high definition.
965
of this project. Time will tell if projects and efforts like this will translate into a cadre of students eager to pursue pediatric surgical training in the future. We hope so. Competitive grant funding has recently been received for the Lights, Camera, Surgery project's continuance.
Acknowledgment The authors would like to acknowledge the UBC Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund.
4. Conclusion The pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery produced 19 instructional videos in 2009 and is anticipated to produce 30 instructional videos in 2010. It was a valuable learning experience for the junior medical student authors and improved their skills in creating and promoting the use of learning resources. This novel approach to engage medical students in the development of educational tools was enthusiastically received and has resulted in the expansion
References [1] Kondro W. Eleven satellite campuses enter orbit of Canadian medical education. Can Med Assoc J 2006;175:461-2. [2] Wear D, Kokinova M, Keck-McNulty C, et al. Pimping: perspectives of 4th year medical students. Teach Learn Med 2005;17(2):184-91. [3] Kelly N, Gaul K, Huynh H, et al. Quality trumps face-to-face presence when delivering lectures in a distributed multi-site medical education programme. Med Ed 2008;42:225.
www.elsevier.com/locate/jpedsurg
Lights, camera, surgery: a novel pilot project to engage medical students in the development of pediatric surgical learning resources Kelvin Kwan, Christopher Wu, Damian Duffy, John Masterson, Geoffrey K. Blair ⁎ The Department of Pediatric Surgery, British Columbia Children's Hospital, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada V6H 3V4 Received 7 February 2011; accepted 11 February 2011
Key words: Video; Online resource; Medical student; Surgical education
Abstract Background/Purpose: It is important to engage junior medical students in the pediatric surgical environment to showcase possible future career choices. Our aim was to assess how the students valued their experience in the realm of clinical learning, exposure to surgical careers, and development of skill sets necessary for creating learning resources. Methods: A novel pilot project entitled Lights, Camera, Surgery engaged 13 medical students in the production of instructional videos of basic surgical procedures. An electronic survey questionnaire allowed the students to provide formal feedback on the project outcomes. Results: Of the students who responded, 87.5% expressed appreciation of the enhanced clinical experience. All of the students either agreed or strongly agreed that the project afforded them valuable leadership experience, practical skills in creating educational learning resources, and opportunities to explore careers in surgery. All of the students either agreed or strongly agreed that the project allowed them to gain valuable skills in educational video production. The project videos are now available as educational tools. Conclusions: Engaging medical students in the production of surgical videos potentially improves leadership skills and promotes the use of educational resources while affording them opportunities to explore pediatric surgery as a future career choice. © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Distributed medical education has led to a necessary increase in the use of new learning resources to bridge multiple satellite campuses to their main campus. For instance, in the autumn of 2011, the University of British
⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 (604)875-2706; fax: +1 (604)875 2721. E-mail address: [email protected] (G.K. Blair). 0022-3468/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jpedsurg.2011.02.029
Columbia (UBC) Faculty of Medicine will launch the South Medical program, which will be the fourth satellite campus in UBC's MD undergraduate program. Aside from UBC, other Canadian universities have also launched distributed medical education programs. There are currently 11 satellite campuses across Canada in which more than 250 medical students will graduate from each year [1]. Many of these students may have potential interest in pediatric surgery as a future career choice, but how can we best expose them early
Lights, camera, surgery: novel pilot project to engage students to the opportunities of a pediatric surgical career in the context of satellite campus training that may be far from pediatric surgical centers? Our UBC Department of Pediatric Surgery was particularly interested in ways that would engage junior medical students in the pediatric surgical environment to showcase possible future career choices. In 2009, the department of pediatric surgery, with funding from the UBC Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund, initiated a pilot project entitled Lights, Camera, Surgery, and as of the summer of 2010, the project is currently running in its second year. The purpose of this project was for medical students to participate in the design and production of instructional videos for teaching basic surgical procedures. These instructional videos would broaden access to clinical learning resources and opportunities for medical students regardless of their geographic campus location. A major goal of Lights, Camera, Surgery was to foster an early interest among students in the surgical disciplines by promoting participation early in preclinical training. In addition, the project aimed to assess how the students valued their experience in the realm of clinical learning, exposure to surgical careers, and the development of skill sets necessary for creating learning resources.
1. Methods
963
assess whether the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery engaged student authors in the development of pediatric surgical learning resources and allowed them to (1) broaden access to clinical learning resources, (2) explore careers within the surgical environment, (3) develop skill sets necessary for creating online resources, and (4) ignite their leadership in creating clinical learning resources. The survey used a 5-step Likert scale (strongly disagree, disagree, neutral, agree, or strongly agree) as well as comment boxes for the student authors to list strengths of the project, areas needing improvement, and how this project had influenced their career path.
2. Results 2.1. Instructional videos In 2009, the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery created 19 instructional videos within the categories of anesthesiology, general surgery, plastic surgery, safety/procedural, and urology (Table 1). The instructional videos varied in length from 3 to 12 minutes, with an average length of 6 minutes. A still of an instructional video outlining the excision of a skin lesion is shown in Fig. 1. The project videos are now available on a secure, password-protected site at UBC as learning resources.
1.1. Creation of surgical instructional videos In 2009, 13 medical students in first or second year of the 4-year UBC MD undergraduate program, placed in teams of 2 or 3, were given 19 key surgical procedures selected by surgical faculty who acted as mentors. These student authors were given leadership roles in storyboarding, film production, and learning how to film within the surgical setting. A professional videographer coached the student authors on storyboarding and filming, whereas the surgical mentor worked with the student authors on the key concepts of the surgical procedure. The student authors obtained media consent for filming in the operating room from the hospital, staff, and patients or parents of the patients. All completed instructional videos were to be uploaded on a secure, password-protected site at UBC, accessible only to medical students, staff, and faculty for learning purposes. In 2010, 10 students were given 30 procedures using the aforementioned methods.
1.2. Assessing how the student authors valued their experience At the end of the pilot project in 2009, an electronic survey questionnaire allowed the student authors to provide formal feedback on the project outcomes. This survey was considered completely optional. The survey was used to
Table 1 Instructional videos completed by the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery in 2009 Video title
Video category
Intubation Intravenous Insertion Venous Access Device Insertion Nasogastric Tube Insertion Fine Needle Aspiration Thyroid Biopsy Atrial Septal Defect Repair Thoracoscopy Excisional Biopsy Needlestick Injury Closed Gowning and Gloving Technique Open Gowning and Gloving Technique Flexible Diagnostic Cystoscopy Pyeloplasty Pediatric Circumcision Suprapubic Catheterization Robotic Prostatectomy Ureteroscopy Varicocele Repair Female Catheterization
Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric Pediatric
anesthesiology anesthesiology general surgery general surgery general surgery
Pediatric cardiac Surgery Pediatric general surgery Pediatric plastic surgery Surgical safety/procedural Surgical safety/procedural Surgical safety/procedural Urology Pediatric urology Pediatric urology Pediatric urology Urology Urology Urology Urology
964
Fig. 1 A still of an instructional video outlining the excision of a skin lesion entitled Excisional Biopsy.
2.2. Costs of instructional videos In 2009, the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery received Can $22,350 in funding. This funding served to pay the junior students' summer employment wages as well as all costs associated with video production. The creation of 19 instructional videos resulted in each video costing an average of Can $1176, including the student wages. However, it is important to note the one-time investment for the video camera, laptop, and editing software. The cost of videos produced in 2010 was estimated to be closer to Can $800.
2.3. Student author survey Eight of 13 surveyed student authors responded. Of the student authors who responded, none of them had previous experience with filming, storyboarding, editing, or producing learning resources. Seven (87.5%) had an opportunity to gain clinical experience in the operating room throughout the project.
K. Kwan et al. In brief, the survey results found that 87.5% of the student authors who responded expressed appreciation for the enhanced clinical experience, particularly recognizing that for many of the medical students, this was their first experience in an operating room. All the student authors either agreed or strongly agreed that the project afforded them valuable leadership experience, practical skills in creating educational learning resources, and opportunities to explore careers in surgery. All of the student authors either agreed or strongly agreed that the project allowed them to gain valuable skills in educational video production including video filming and video editing. A full summary of the survey is shown in Fig. 2. The written feedback portions of the survey from the student authors were mostly positive. The general theme revolved around how the project allowed them to explore surgery earlier in their medical education and how the project helped them in their consideration of surgery as a career.
3. Discussion We believe that the Lights, Camera, Surgery project served as an ideal forum for our junior medical students to link with staff mentors in pediatric surgery, as well as some mentors in nonpediatric surgery and pediatric anesthesia. It gave them exposure to clinical surgery with a purpose as opposed to just passively observing operations and perhaps being “pimped” by a well-meaning but possibly intimidating staff surgeon [2]. The electronic survey, by which means we collected the student's opinions about the project and their experience, did have a suboptimal return rate. However, it was completely voluntary and was undertaken after their summer engagement with Lights, Camera, Surgery had finished and they were deep into their second- or third-year curriculum. Of those who did respond, their reports were, on the whole, very positive, but it will be important that, after our next iteration of the project in 2010, the survey be more rigorous and that it include the responses of the mentors as well. The overall, generally positive perception of the project and its novelty in the way it allowed for purposeful engagement of the junior medical students in our discipline, we believe, justified this report.
3.1. Expansion of Lights, Camera, Surgery
Fig. 2 A summary of the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery student author survey in 2009. On the 5-step Likert scale, “neutral,” “agree,” and “strongly agree” are proportionately represented by white, gray, and black bars, respectively. There were no responses of “strongly disagree” or “disagree.” The numbers inside the bars represent the percentage of the respective response by the student authors.
The success and enthusiasm of the pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery in 2009 led to the continuation and expansion of the project in 2010 to include more disciplines related to surgery. This has opened 2 new partnerships: one with the UBC Palliative Care department, and the other with the British Columbia Patient Safety and Quality Council. Furthermore, the Lights, Camera, Surgery project in 2010 included the addition of cardiac and orthopedic surgeries
Lights, camera, surgery: novel pilot project to engage students instructional videos. The end of the project anticipates 30 additional instructional videos in 2010. It is important to consider the quality of the videos produced. Medical students in the UBC MD undergraduate program preferred quality rather than the local availability of resources [3]. Therefore, if a surgical procedure was not common, students at any campus of the UBC MD undergraduate program could observe these instructional videos. As indicated in Fig. 1, these instructional videos were clear and in high definition.
965
of this project. Time will tell if projects and efforts like this will translate into a cadre of students eager to pursue pediatric surgical training in the future. We hope so. Competitive grant funding has recently been received for the Lights, Camera, Surgery project's continuance.
Acknowledgment The authors would like to acknowledge the UBC Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund.
4. Conclusion The pilot project Lights, Camera, Surgery produced 19 instructional videos in 2009 and is anticipated to produce 30 instructional videos in 2010. It was a valuable learning experience for the junior medical student authors and improved their skills in creating and promoting the use of learning resources. This novel approach to engage medical students in the development of educational tools was enthusiastically received and has resulted in the expansion
References [1] Kondro W. Eleven satellite campuses enter orbit of Canadian medical education. Can Med Assoc J 2006;175:461-2. [2] Wear D, Kokinova M, Keck-McNulty C, et al. Pimping: perspectives of 4th year medical students. Teach Learn Med 2005;17(2):184-91. [3] Kelly N, Gaul K, Huynh H, et al. Quality trumps face-to-face presence when delivering lectures in a distributed multi-site medical education programme. Med Ed 2008;42:225.