• Anders J Debes, Rajesh Aggarwal, Indran Balasundaram, and Morten B J Jacobsen.
• Department of Surgery, Oestfold Hospital Trust, N-1603 Fredrikstad, Norway. anders@debes.no
• Am. J. Surg. 2012 Jun 1; 203 (6): 768-75.

BackgroundSurgical training programs are now including simulators as training tools for teaching laparoscopic surgery. The aim of this study was to develop a standardized, graduated, and evidence-based curriculum for the newly developed D-box (D-box Medical, Lier, Norway) for training basic laparoscopic skills.MethodsEighteen interns with no laparoscopic experience completed a training program on the D-box consisting of 8 sessions of 5 tasks with assessment on a sixth task. Performance was measured by the use of 3-dimensional electromagnetic tracking of hand movements, path length, and time taken. Ten experienced surgeons (>100 laparoscopic surgeries, median 250) were recruited for establishing benchmark criteria.ResultsSignificant learning curves were obtained for all construct valid parameters for tasks 4 (P < .005) and 5 (P < .005) and reached plateau levels between the fifth and sixth session. Within the 8 sessions of this study, between 50% and 89% of the interns reached benchmark criteria on tasks 4 and 5.ConclusionsBenchmark criteria and an evidence-based curriculum have been developed for the D-box. The curriculum is aimed at training and assessing surgical novices in basic laparoscopic skills.Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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