>CYBER-BASED EDUCATION AND DISTANT LEARNING

Overview of some Education Programs

The Minimally Invasive Surgery Distance Education Support Program is an innovative continuing education program that addresses an obstacle to the proliferation of advanced laparoscopic procedures.  Once a surgeons goes back to a community after a short course, support is needed to instill confidence and to facilitate patient quality assurance.  The assistance is made possible with the use of computer based training tools and telecommunications.

The Advanced Laparoscopic & Technology Preceptorship (a.k.a. the six-week cybersurgeon program) is advanced minimally invasive surgery and technology is another non-traditional educational concept that was formulated after learning of the disappointingly low experience numbers by minimally invasive surgery fellowships in this country and abroad.  It was felt that intense, tightly structured educational experience with expanded animal model experience could facilitate the establishment of superior skills and technique.  This program is meant to accelerate the number of trained surgeons in the community.

The Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy and Biliary Tract Surgery Enhancement Course has been developed to provide surgeons who have caused common bile duct injuries, an educational experience to decrease the risk of committing further injuries during minimally invasive surgery.  The innovative course provides an objective based remedial effort that stresses objective based clinical skill and judgment, empowerment and patient safety as their number one goals.

The Top Gun Skill Development competition seeks to provide a competitive format to promote the aggressive pursuit of advanced laparoscopic skill development.  It features the Rosser Training System that employs the use of preparatory drills to help speed development of intracorporeal suturing and minimally invasive surgery skills.  Over 4,000 participants have completed the course to date.  A large database has been tabulated and can provide instantaneous percentile rankings to allow surgeons to know where they stand with their colleagues around the world.

Dr. Rosser has authored a host of CD-ROM based educational tutorials for surgeons, nurses and patients.  His expansion of these tutorials to the Internet has already garnered rave reviews.  

To date, Dr. Rosser has successfully performed over 3000 procedures and has made lasting contributions to the efficiency and safety of numerous minimally invasive procedures.