Delivering videos of surgical operations from operating theatres within the participating centres

The aim of SANTTSUR was to deliver a course of 30 high quality, live, interactive TV programmes over a period of a year to selected hospital centres, based on a modular syllabus that is complementary to the Royal College of Surgeons of England's (RCSEng) established STEP course materials. The project imported live surgical video from operating theatres within the participating centres at high quality for inclusion into the TV broadcasts to all sites and provided interaction with trainees and local Surgical Tutors via voice, e-mail/chat and video conferencing during the live transmissions. The benefit of SANTTSUR to surgeon trainees lay in providing an interactive learning environment and high quality learning materials at the workplace. It is important to all trainees and Surgical Tutors, all with busy schedules, that no time is wasted travelling to a different location. Benefits of cost saving in time and benefits to the environment were thus also identified. The synchronisation of the training period across multiple hospitals facilitated more efficient sharing of expertise from dispersed Surgical Tutors and encouraged peer interaction at each site. The viability of the approach was considered in the light of experiences and perception of trainees. In particular the developing partnership between the University of Plymouth and The Royal College of Surgeons of England was discussed in the context of viability. As a result of this partnership it is expected to develop SANTTSUR and STEP into a new course, teleSTEP and this concept will be explored. The Final Review was completed successfully at the University of Plymouth on 16 and 17 April 2002.