Metrics for Success in a Surgical Innovation Fellowship.

The nature of a dedicated research time during surgical residency has evolved from a traditional basic science laboratory experience to include translational and outcomes research, investigations in improving surgical education, secondary degrees, and other clinical fellowships as trainees have sought an increasingly wide range of experiences. Moreover, many surgical specialties have seen a burst of innovation with new devices, implants, tools, and software to improve the care of surgical patients and minimize complications. This environment has led to a surge in interest in innovation, often focused on surgical device development. Despite this groundswell of interest in innovation at the trainee and program level, there is little structure or curriculum available which outlines a formalized pathway for innovation within a surgical residency, nor is there information on how the success of that program may be evaluated. We present the model we developed for a Surgical Innovation Fellowship and propose means for evaluation of the success of that fellowship.

Surgical Innovation Discovery Course: Utilizing Surgical Trainee Agile Innovation and Empowerment (STAIR) Framework to Promote Innovation Amongst Surgical Residents.

INTRODUCTION: Innovation education programs can help guide and empower surgeons and surgical trainees through the many steps to analyze and de-risk novel ideas to impact healthcare or care delivery. Providing quality programming that is conducive to a surgeon's busy schedule is an ongoing challenge, but even more so for a surgical trainees' schedule. Through a needs assessment and applying lean principles, the "Surgical Trainee Agile Innovation and empoweRment" (STAIR) framework was created to encourage surgical trainees to participate in innovation programming. OBJECTIVE: Numerous works have explored the design and development of learning experiences to support physician innovators. However, there is a lack of evidence supporting frameworks that contribute to innovation empowerment for surgical trainees as a complement to the demands of clinical practice. The following catalogs the systematic design and development of a novel innovation and discovery agile framework tailored to surgical residents with original innovation ideas. DESIGN AND SETTING: The course designed to implement the "Surgical Trainee Agile Innovation and empoweRment" (STAIR) is funded through the Department of Surgery at the University of Michigan. It is an 8-week team-based innovation course designed for surgical residents to learn and apply fundamental innovation concepts to clinical problems. PARTICIPANTS AND RESULTS: Surgical trainees in all programs at the host institution are all eligible to participate. A total of four innovation teams were selected to participate in inaugural course. CONCLUSIONS: The novel instructional design and development of this course encouraged participation in surgical innovation programming. The course aided the development of innovative ideas and inspired interest in innovation among surgical trainees. The STAIR framework is exemplary for inspiring and facilitating innovation among surgical trainees, enhancing the professional experience.

International Mixed Reality Immersive Experience: Approach via Surgical Grand Rounds.

BACKGROUND: Coronavirus disease 2019 created unintended but significant experiential barriers for surgical learners to interact at the bedside for teaching/case presentations. We hypothesized that an international grand rounds using the Microsoft HoloLens 2 extended reality (XR) headset would create an improved bedside-learning experience compared to traditional grand rounds formats. STUDY DESIGN: From December 2020 to March 2021, the world's first 2 international mixed reality grand rounds events using the HoloLens 2 headset were held, broadcasting transatlantically (between the University of Michigan and the Imperial College of London) bedside rounding experiences on 5 complex surgical patients to an international audience of 325 faculty, residents, and medical trainees. Participants completed pre- and post-event surveys to assess their experience. RESULTS: Of the 325 participants, 267 (80%) completed pre-surveys, and 95 (29%) completed both the pre- and post-surveys. Respondents (average age, 38 y; 44% women, 56% men; 211 US, 56 UK) included 92 (34%) medical students and residents and 175 faculty and staff. In the pre-event survey, 76% had little or no earlier experience with XR devices, and 94% thought implementation of XR into medical curricula was valuable. In the post-survey, 96% thought telerounding using XR technology was important for the current era, and 99% thought the ability to visualize the examination, imaging, and laboratory results at bedside via XR rounding was highly valuable and that this format was superior to traditional grand rounds. CONCLUSIONS: Almost all of the participants in the mixed reality international grand rounds felt the immersive XR experiences-allowing visualization of clinical findings, imaging, and laboratory results at the patient's bedside-were superior to a traditional grand rounds format, and that it could be a valuable tool for surgical teaching and telerounding.