Author: Brigitte Rohner

The 4-year Innosuisse Flagship funded project PROFICIENCY has been kicked-off today. The entire project team had the opportunity to give a try to surgical simulators from VirtaMed AG. Conclusion of our surgeons: “These machines are astonishing realistic! Together with these machines we can create the future surgical training!”

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Prof Dieter Hahnloser, Visceral Surgeon at CHUV, gives a try to one of VirtaMed’s surgical simulators.

At the first in-person meeting we were greatly hosted by our industrial partners, VirtaMed AG in Schlieren. During the phase of project and application development, no detailed discussions have been possible. Hence, the informal chats in Schlieren have been highly appreciated to remove ambiguity and get a feeling for each other.

An overview on the project design and the three different subprojects has been presented to bring the entire team up to speed. These presentations were essential for the project team that meanwhile has expanded. The leaders of the subprojects have all stressed the need of close collaboration between surgeons and engineers/software developer both focusing on medical solutions as well as learning psychologists. This close interdisciplinary get-together has been acknowledged to be the basis to provide the solutions that can initiate a paradigm shift in surgical training and education for optimally prepared surgeons and even greater patient safety.

As always the organizational issues did not attract the highest interest of the team… Therefore, that part has been sped up but have still ensured the proper management of the project to achieve the planned goals and to communicate the results to public audience .