Medicine is increasingly discovering virtual reality for itself. After surgical training has changed very little in the last decades, the current situation with COVID-19 and social distancing is causing universities and hospitals to become creative.
Normally it works like this: Residents observe experienced surgeons at work and gradually begin to take on responsibility in the operating room themselves. But in this model, only a few junior doctors can be trained and a large number of personnel is required. Sandra Humbles, Vice President of Global Education Solutions at Johnson & Johnson Medical Devices, wants to revolutionize this type of training and is taking full advantage of the current technological possibilities. Especially when introducing new technological devices in the operating room, doctors were often on their own and even experienced surgeons had to spend a long time learning how to use the devices. In a cooperation between Johnson & Johnson and Osso VR this is now to be put to an end. Learning in the operating room, whether because of new equipment or because it is a learning assistant doctor, must arrive in the 21st century.
“We knew VR could help surgeons learn new procedures faster than traditional teaching methods like watching videos or reading textbooks…what would have been nearly impossible just a short while ago is now within our reach thanks to Oculus.”
In order to be able to optimally use the very complex medical equipment in the operating room, the teams of both companies have used the Oculus for Business platform to scale the training and make it practice-oriented.
Using the platform and the Oculus headsets, Osso VR developed a training plan for the J&J Institute, where surgeons have the opportunity to rehearse and learn each step of the medical procedure in a realistic virtual environment. Especially the quality management was of central importance here, as the team had to make sure that no mistakes were made in the real situation later on.
After first successful test runs and a huge increase in requests during the Corona pandemic, Osso VR and Johnson & Johnson want to make the VR training plan available to every hospital in the world to revolutionize surgical training also nationwide.
