Development of a Novel Peer-sharing Application to Supplement Learning from Cadaveric Dissection

A Systematic Scoping Review of the Current Applications of Digital Technology in Undergraduate Surgical Education

Over the past few decades, technological advancements have established digital tools as an indispensable pedagogical resource in the realm of modern education. In the field of medical education, there is growing interest in how these digital tools can be effectively integrated to enhance undergraduate surgical education. However, despite their well-documented potential benefits, research specifically investigating the current use of digital technology in undergraduate surgical education remains limited, highlighting a critical gap in the existing literature. To address this research gap, this scoping review aims to elucidate the current utilisation of digital technologies in undergraduate surgical education by addressing the research question: 'How are digital technologies currently being utilised in undergraduate surgical education to meet surgical learning outcomes'. A scoping review was performed, adopting the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) framework. A comprehensive search strategy was conducted using the search terms 'technology' OR 'simulation' OR 'virtual reality' OR 'augmented reality' OR 'digital' OR 'online' AND 'undergraduate' AND 'surgical' on multiple electronic bibliographic databases including PubMed, Medline, ERIC, Embase, Scopus and Web of Science. These search terms were executed using both free-text and MeSH terms, with search terms combined using Boolean operators to ensure all relevant citations were captured. All search results were screened against the eligibility criteria using Covidence, a web-based software platform, using a two-stage process. Subsequently, all included studies were reviewed, and the extracted data was systematically sorted and organised, with the findings presented graphically accompanied by descriptive narratives. A thematic analysis was also performed to identify themes within the data to synthesise key findings. This scoping review revealed three key findings. First, the use of digital tools in surgical education has been steadily increasing over the past few decades, with the COVID-19 pandemic accelerating the integration of technology into surgical education. Second, this review also highlighted the key role of anatomy within surgical education, with most included studies reporting the use of digital technologies to enhance anatomy teaching. Finally, this review provided an overview of various digital tools used in surgical education and their associated user experiences. Overall, most studies indicated that digital technologies are well-received by students, with many advocating for their continued use in supplementing surgical education even beyond the pandemic. This review provides a crucial foundation for understanding the evolving role of digital innovations in shaping undergraduate surgical education. To enhance undergraduate surgical education, integrating appropriate digital learning tools can provide more learner-centred and personalised learning experiences. Educators must recognise that there is no 'one-size-fits-all' approach, and a flexible multimodal strategy is necessary to meet diverse learning needs. As technology continues to evolve and its role in education grows, this review offers valuable insights into the current use of digital tools in surgical education, highlighting opportunities for improvement and innovation to further enhance undergraduate surgical experience.

Revolutionising Anatomy Education: The Current Role of Digital Technologies in Enhancing Anatomy Learning for Undergraduate Medical Students

Anatomy education, which forms the cornerstone of today's medical education, has traditionally centered on cadaveric dissections and prosections as its core teaching methods. However, these methods present with challenges, including student anxiety, nausea, and limited cadaver availability. Recent advancements in digital technologies have led to the proliferation of innovative learning tools, introducing novel and transformative approaches to enhance anatomy education. While numerous studies explore the potential applications of innovative technologies in anatomy education, few studies have examined their current application in anatomy teaching for undergraduate medical students. This gap in the literature is significant, as understanding the usability and acceptance of digital tools in anatomy teaching is crucial for ensuring that students receive high-quality education. To address this, a comprehensive review was undertaken to explore the breadth of research activity in this field, exploring the integration of digital technologies in anatomy teaching. This review aimed to address the research question: "How are digital technologies currently being used in the delivery of anatomy teaching in undergraduate medical education?". A systematic search was performed across multiple databases including PubMed, MEDLINE, Education Resources Information Center (ERIC), Embase, Scopus, and Web of Science, with studies screened using Covidence (Veritas Health Innovation, Melbourne, Australia), a web-based software platform. Eligible studies were systematically reviewed and data extracted and organised, with findings presented graphically, accompanied by descriptive narratives. Our findings indicate that while innovative digital tools are increasingly being adopted, many medical schools continue to rely predominantly on traditional cadaver-based methods for anatomy teaching. Only a limited number of institutions have fully integrated digital technologies into their teaching practices. Additionally, traditional approaches, such as cadaveric dissections and prosections, remain the preferred choice among students for learning anatomy. A commonly reported limitation of digital tools is their difficulty in effectively conveying spatial relationships between anatomical structures, a critical component in anatomy learning. Despite this, recent studies have revealed that students and educators increasingly value multimodal approaches that combine traditional cadaver-based teaching methods with digital tools to enhance anatomy learning. This review provides valuable insights into how digital technology is currently being utilised in anatomy teaching for undergraduate medical students. We found that while various innovative pedagogical approaches have been adopted in anatomy teaching, traditional methods such as cadaveric dissections and prosections remain the most preferred by students. While digital technology is increasingly being used to complement anatomical education, modern anatomy teaching currently adopts an integrated and multimodal approach, utilising various pedagogical methods to enhance anatomy learning. It is therefore essential that educators recognise that no single pedagogical approach suits all students and a combination of various modalities is often required to meet diverse learning needs in anatomy teaching.

Empowering human anatomy education through gamification and artificial intelligence: An innovative approach to knowledge appropriation

Gamification has appeared as an alternative educational methodology to traditional tools. Specifically, in anatomy teaching, multiple technological applications have emerged in response to the difficulties of accessing cadaveric material; however, there is insufficient information about the effects of these applications on the performance achieved by students, or about to the best way to adapt learning to meet their educational needs. In this study, we investigated how teaching human anatomy through a mobile gamified technological tool containing recommendation systems can be combined with a virtual assistant to improve the learning and academic performance of medical students in the Anatomy Department at the Universidad de La Frontera in Temuco, Chile and the Anatomy Department at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. In total, 131 students participated in the experiment, which was divided into two case studies. The main findings led to the conclusion that gamified components support students in learning anatomy. In addition, the predictions and recommendations provided by the virtual assistant enabled the academic aspects that the students needed to improve to be extracted adequately. Future work is expected to support adaptive learning by incorporating new artificial intelligence in education elements that can generate personalized scenarios for studying anatomy based on the application.

A Pre-Clerkship Medical Education Elective as Catalyst for Student Learning, Faculty Teaching, and Curricular Improvement

Recent reviews of student-as-teacher programs call for early, longitudinal, and timely training in both learning principles and applied teaching skills. We describe a longitudinal elective for pre-clerkship students that includes interactive meetings addressing a range of theoretical and practical teaching topics and the tools needed to conduct medical education research.

Usage of Student-Created Anatomical Diagrams Shared on Social Media

Social media (SoMe) is a resource for electronic materials in medical education, but has been particularly relevant for anatomy education due to the visual nature of the discipline. Although the distribution of expert/faculty-created anatomy content has been documented, the usefulness of novice/student-created content distributed via SoMe remains undetermined. To address this, original anatomical diagrams (n = 127) created by a novice educator were disseminated via the Anatomy Adventures Instagram account and evaluated for their usefulness. Audience engagement was evaluated using descriptive statistics, with a mean number of likes for all posts (n = 61) of 62.54 + 15.70. Statistically significant differences in the number of likes across content topics were assessed using a Kruskal-Wallis test (H(41.09) = 4, p < 0.005). An 11-item survey (10.6% response rate) explored the (1) population demographics, (2) diagram utility, and (3) suggestions for improvement. Responses were converted to percent frequencies and assessed with chi-square. Descriptive codes were applied to open-ended responses according to published methods. Of the 111 survey responses, 95% of participants were 18-30 years, with the majority of participants being medical students (69.3%), undergraduate/graduate students (16.2%), and fully employed (12.6%). Participants report using the diagrams to study for coursework or board examinations (54%), while non-medical use (42.4%) included leisure viewing or reviewing for their occupation. The usefulness of the diagrams was attributed to their (1) simplicity (43%), (2) style (24.6%), and (3) color-coding (12.3%) (p = 0.0025). These data indicate that Instagram may be utilized by novice educators to provide accurate and accessible resources.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-023-01736-9.

Universal design for learning in anatomy education of healthcare students: A scoping review

There are concerns among healthcare practitioners about poor anatomical knowledge among recent healthcare graduates. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework developed to enhance students' experience of learning and help students to become motivated learners. This scoping review identified whether UDL has been utilized in third level healthcare education and if so, whether it had been used to enhance student motivation to study anatomy. Seven online databases were searched for studies reporting the use of UDL in the curricula of medical, dental, occupational therapy (OT) or speech and language therapy (SLT) programs. Studies were screened for eligibility with set inclusion criteria. Data were extracted and analyzed. Analysis revealed that UDL was not specifically mentioned in any of the studies thus there are no published studies on UDL being formally applied in healthcare education. However, the authors identified 33 publications that described teaching methods which aligned with UDL in anatomy curricula and a thematic analysis yielded four main themes relating to teaching strategies being employed. Universal design for learning was not mentioned specifically, indicating that educators may not be aware of the educational framework, although they appeared to be utilizing aspects of it in their teaching. The review revealed that there is a lack of research concerning the anatomy education of OT and SLT students. The role of UDL in enhancing motivation to learn anatomy in medical, dental, OT and SLT programs has yet to be explored.

Dissection videos as a virtual veterinary anatomy peer learning tool: Trialled at the University of Tehran during the Covid-19 pandemic

The Covid-19 pandemic forced universities around the world to use online education instead of face-to-face teaching. Veterinary anatomy training was also affected, and laboratory classes were disrupted by this transition. To reduce the effects of virtual education on students' anatomy learning, peer learning using dissection videos was introduced at University of Tehran. This study describes the design and implementation of this method and evaluates the students' perceptions regarding this programme. The opinions of 98 students were examined using a questionnaire. The data showed that dissection videos were one of the main sources of anatomy study (67.3%). Among students who used videos, 69.6% students became more interested in anatomy and 73% learned anatomy better with this approach. Students used these videos to review anatomy (88.7%) and even learn new content (87.6%). Most surveyed students used laptops (73%) and cell phones (14.6%) to watch videos. In this study, 19.1% of respondents were estimated to be low users, 68.5% medium users and 12.4% high users. A large number of students (83.1%) trusted their peer teacher in providing the lesson. Dissection videos play an important role in conveying a three-dimensional understanding of anatomical structures, and peer teaching is also effective in learning because of the strong connection between tutors and tutees. This study supports students' acceptance of the use of peer dissection videos for learning online veterinary anatomy.

Immersive Anatomy Atlas: Learning Factual Medical Knowledge in a Virtual Reality Environment

In order to improve learning efficiency and memory retention in medical teaching, furthering active learning seems to be an effective alternative to classical teaching. One option to make active exploration of the subject matter possible is the use of virtual reality (VR) technology. The authors developed an immersive anatomy atlas which allows users to explore human anatomical structures interactively through virtual dissection. Thirty-two senior-class students from two German high schools with no prior formal medical training were separated into two groups and tasked with answering an anatomical questionnaire. One group used traditional anatomical textbooks and the other used the immersive virtual reality atlas. The time needed to answer the questions was measured. Several weeks later, the participants answered a similar questionnaire with different anatomical questions in order to test memory retention. The VR group took significantly less time to answer the questionnaire, and participants from the VR group had significantly better results over both tests. Based on the results of this study, VR learning seems to be more efficient and to have better long-term effects for the study of anatomy. The reason for that could lie in the VR environment's high immersion, and the possibility to freely and interactively explore a realistic representation of human anatomy. Immersive VR technology offers many possibilities for medical teaching and training, especially as a support for cadaver dissection courses.