Haptics in Medical Training

Medicine is an inherently hands-on field of study, with students needing to learn important dexterous clinical skills used in physical examination and surgery. Whilst students are often given opportunities to practice these during placements and residencies, these opportunities are inherently ad-hoc and there is never any guarantee that a medical student will encounter a full range of examinations and conditions during their time in hospital. Student experience in some supernumary specialisms such as dermatology is particularly inconsistent. This project aims to combine haptics and extended reality to create realistic, instructive simulations of the physical examinations taught in the undergraduate medical curriculum to allow students to learn and practice these skills in a consistent and low-risk environment before being asked to perform them on a patient.

Research Aims

• Investigate the challenges in teaching manual skills to medical students
• Investigate approaches to simulating soft tissues using haptic devices
• Explore the benefits of haptic extended reality simulations on student engagement, information retention and confindence

Physical Exmaination

Undergraduate medical students need to learn a wide range of physical examinations, from intimate examinations of the rectum and breast to complex and highly procedural examinations of the neurological end vascular systems. These are examined during medical school throigh practical examinations known as OSCEs which students must pass to continue their studies. Whilst some of these examinations are taught using benchtop models, students usually practice examinations on healthy peers or simulated patients, recieving limited feedback and no exposure to pathology. This project focusses on four physical exmainations for which there is not currently any educational simulation: dermatology, lumps, vascular, and the peripheral neurological examination.

The Role of Haptics

The advantages of including haptic feedback in simulations of physical exmainations is obvious. When examining a lump, a doctor must take note if it’s hardness, texture, mobility, any indications of fluid build up or plusation. Similarly, an examination of the vascular system may reveal high or low skin temperature (indicaitng abnormal blood flow) and a variety of pulse characters. Using haptics to simulate these physical symptoms teaches students to recognise potentially subtle or unintuitive indications, and has the potential to coach dexterous skills that are often missed in conventional teaching.

Deployment and Impact

The project is a collaboration with the Imprial College School of Medicine. Medical students will participant in pilots of the simulations during their clinical skills and methods classes, and work is underway to organize the long-term inclusion of these simulations in the undergraduate medical curriculum.