Creation of an Educational Anatomical Bronchoscopy Model
The aim was to make an anatomical model of a tracheobronchial tree and investigate its suitability for fiber optic bronchoscopy training.
Methods. The model was made using the papier-mâché technique. Photos of the trachea, the carina and the right bronchus were made during the fiber optic bronchoscopy procedure and put next to real human photos. Medical students (n=54) performed fiber optic bronchoscopy on our model and on the commercial trainer after the lecture. They and 8 certified anaesthesiology experts took the semi-structured interview about the students’ made model. Differences in the duration of fiber optic bronchoscopy on both trainers were measured by the Wilcoxon signed ranks test at P<0.05.
Results. All the experts and 91% of the students confirmed that bronchoscopic images of our model were similar to human. Everyone agreed that our model was useful for learning and was worth the time spent producing it, and 37.5% of the experts and 58.5% of the students stated that it was suitable for training and gaining motor skills. Besides, 12.5% of the experts and 24.5% of the students emphasised low production costs of this model. Meanwhile, 12.5% of the experts and 26.4% of the students noted its temporality and fast obsolescence after many bronchoscopy tests. Besides, 24.5% of the experts and 35.8% of the students argued that white colour, texture and absence of tracheal rings in our model reduced similarity to real anatomy. However, there was no statistically significant difference between duration of bronchoscopy in both.
Conclusions. The designed fiber optic bronchoscopy model was anatomically correct and cheap. There was no statistically significant difference between the duration of bronchoscopy performance in the two models: the fiber optic bronchoscopy model designed for the purposes of the study and the commercial trainer.
Correspondence to . Department of Anaesthesiology, Medical Academy, Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, Eivenių 2, LT-50161 Kaunas, Lithuania. E-mail: dalia.ranceviene@gmail.com