To be a good surgeon... it's a good idea to play some sort of video game

A quick PubMed search reveals there are at least 53 publications relating to the topic of video games and surgical skill development.

In a very recent review article (Lynch et al, 2010) 12 research papers were discovered relating to different kinds of keyhole and robotic surgery on different parts of the body.  The findings from all of these papers were analysed and it was found that there was a link between gaming and increased performance in keyhole but not robotic surgery. The increased performance was only seen in basic tasks. For more complex tasks and in robotic surgery the most important factor was experience of the specific surgical technique. All of the studies involved very small numbers of people and short periods of game play (between 2 and 5 weeks) and more subtle differences may not have been seen, differences that were seen may have been exaggerated and the effect of long term gaming (years) or gaming in childhood cannot be examined.

It must be noted however that there is much more to being a good surgeon than being good with your hands. Surgery, like all medical specialisms, is a team sport. Communication skills within that team, both in theatre and in follow up is vitally important to patient outcome. So is good clinical knowledge and judgement.

References
Lynch, J., Aughwane, P. & Hammond, T. M. (2010) Video games and surgical ability: a literature review. Journal of Surgical Education, 67 (3), 184-189. 

Milo Wars 2

Apologies for the lateness of this post. I have been snowed under with coursework recently.

The last post sparked outrage in the blogosphere heated debate amongst people that read and follow my blog. For many people this was an emotive issue, mispronouncing the name of a hot drink they have known and loved from childhood. At first among the people I had asked there seemed to be a north/south divide - the divide being the equator. Those in the north (from Ghana and Nigeria and the UK) seemed to favour 'Millow' pronounciation, and those from the south (from Zambia, Zimbawe, South Africa and New Zealand) favouring My-lo.

The poll results say it all, after all the shouting intensely emotional discussion the consensus is split cleanly down the middle, 11 votes for Millow and 11 for My-lo. (I have ignored the accusations of cheating here)

However, as other countries joined in the debate for the My-lo cause namely Jamaica and Sri Lanka, it seemed to turn into a West Africa (Millow) vs the rest of the world (Mylo) debate. (I personally think that we can handle those odds). I would like to thank my Sri Lankan friend Jehan, who did the YouTube research that gave me the videos below.

 

So I guess we will all have to make up our minds on this one.

(Hint hint - it's Millow)

Milo: The Great Pronunciation Debate

You say to-mah-to, I say to-may-to, right? Apparently you can have either way right? It doesn't matter right? Wrong! Well, it's wrong when it comes to this  famous energy food drink.

I've noticed recently that my Southern African friends pronounce it as 'My-lo' like it's a name, whereas my friends above the equator and particularly in West Africa pronounce it as 'Millow' (like it rhymes with willow).

My opinion - you can't drink a person. I was raised on 'Millow'. Am I right? Comment below or use the poll to the right.

Pimsleur Twi Review

As you know over the last few months I have been attempting to learn Twi, an Akan language of Ghana, where I am originally from. To do this I bought a Twi-English dictionary and the Pimsleur Twi Audio CD set. Here are my thoughts on it.

The Pimsleur Twi Audio course is a 10 lesson audio course with a short accompanying reading booklet. Each audio lesson is about 20-25 minutes long and the course is designed for you to complete one lesson a day, everyday if possible. Reading lessons are much shorter (2 – 5 minutes) and are separate from the main audio part. The reading lessons took place roughly every other day. The material covered included basic that you would encounter as a tourist in Ghana e.g.: introducing yourself, asking for directions, and buying food and drink etc.

I have to say that this is the first ever teach-yourself-a-language course that I have ever managed to complete. Usually I get bored or find the language too difficult to learn and give up.  The Pimsleur course was actually engaging and enjoyable. It also went at a pace that was easy to follow. It may have helped that I was already a bit familiar with the language. However there were days that I did have to repeat because I struggled with the lesson the first time round.

Let’s play the Plagiarism Game: the cite is right!

My university have an incredibly boring plagiarism lecture every year for which attendance is compulsory. A register is taken. During the lecture we have to complete exercises where we look for evidence of plagiarism in (supposedly) real submitted pieces of work. At the end of the torture we have a quiz (oh joy!) that you have to pass. It is two hours of your life you are never going to get back.

So during this last torture session I had an idea for fresh new delivery of the material.

Introducing (drum roll please)…‘The Plagiarism Game: the cite is right!’

You play the character Student [insert your name here] as you struggle through the perilous terrain of coursework-land battling the evil plagiarising creatures therein. The twin demons of ‘copy and paste’ shall fall before your sword of citation and your quiver of quotation marks. Beware the deceptive mist of’ just-rearranging-the-words’ though that will confuse your avatar and deplete your timeline more quickly. Traverse or avoid the murky swamp of ‘misinterpreting-common-knowledge'. And finally battle the most difficult enemy of all the shadow avatar of self-plagiarism’. It knows all your tricks, all your moves. How will you fare? With your arsenal of appropriately sourced references nothing should stop you from attaining your goal of a publication in a prestigious scientific or medical journal however you must get through the game first.

Let’s be honest though, this would only really appeal to people who would be into games though. Oops! I forgot what field I’m in.

There may already be an app for that.