Surgeon and Assistant Point of View Simultaneous Video Recording

Video recording has become a very common practice in surgery and is one of the paramount methods to teach proper surgical techniques. Traditionally it has been limited by a variety of factors including cost, the need for constant camera reposition, and the use of external photographers, which is both costly and labor-intensive. We describe the use of dual modified point of view (POV) GoPro head mounted cameras to record synchronized POV surgery for the purpose of training surgical assistants. POV cameras are inexpensive, easy to use and manipulate. The GoPro camera was mounted using a head strap on both the surgeon's and surgical assistant's head, providing different optimal views. We used the GoPro Hero4 Silver for the surgeon and the GoPro Hero3+ Black Edition for the assistant. The lens used was optimized for our purposes. With the modified camera for the primary surgeon, the magnification was satisfactory in recording of fine details, and provided a usable depth of field and field of view. We found that using two synchronized POV GoPro head mounted cameras was an innovative way to record otolaryngology surgery and provided excellent video footage which can be used for the education of both surgeons and surgical assistants.