Background: Plastic surgery is considered one of the
unique surgical specialties as any minimal surgical inaccuracy
may cause affection of the final outcome, so simulation technology,
which considered the future of plastic surgery education,
should be introduced for surgical skills and knowledge transfer.
Training programs have been changed to be performed in
surgical skills laboratories rather than surgical theaters, in
which, trainee can gain surgical skills by using training models.
These laboratories have been settled not to replace the operating
theater experience, but to supplement it.
Aim of Study: Is to develop a bench model for training
on all crucial basic steps in cleft palate surgery, and to validate
this model regarding its educational effectiveness and its
ability to transfer operative skills from the bench in the skills
lab to real life in operative theaters.
Material and Methods: A life-size bench model of cleft
palate was customized with respect to actual size and anatomy
of tissues at 18 month of age. The study period was 6 months,
it entails comparing performance and operative timing of two
groups of plastic surgery trainees performing primary repair
of isolated cleft palate in theatre. Our model was delivered
to group II only before real surgical assessment. Intraoperative
evaluation of both groups of surgeons was done using the
Global Rating index for Technical Skills (GRITS) and the
time taken to complete the operation.
Results: Our study revealed a significant improvement
in Group II GRITS score by 63.2% and significant shortening
of operative time in Group II by 36.5%.
Conclusion: This study provides the plastic surgery community
with a novel cleft palate bench model as a validated
training tool. After a single session, we observed improvement
in cleft palate procedural skills, confidence, knowledge and
shortening in time taken to finish the operation among trainees.
Additional research is needed to assess the durability of these
improvements over time, and also the benefit of additional
sessions with the bench model.