Chemical Components of Smoke Produced From Versatile Training Tissue Models Using Electrocautery

Area of Science:

• Surgical Simulation and Training
• Occupational Health and Safety
• Chemical Analysis of Surgical Smoke

Background:

• Surgical smoke poses health risks to operating room staff.
• Similar risks exist for users in surgical simulation and training environments.
• The chemical composition of smoke from training models requires investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine the chemical composition of smoke from the Versatile Training Tissue (VTT) model.
• To compare VTT smoke with smoke from chemosynthetic models and porcine tissues.
• To assess the safety of VTT models for surgical simulation.

Main Methods:

• Models including VTT, polyvinyl alcohol, porcine muscle, and liver were cauterized.
• Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) was used for substance identification and quantification.
• High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and a smoke tube kit were also employed for analysis.

Main Results:

• VTT smoke primarily consists of water and carbon dioxide, with few organic compounds.
• The number of compounds in VTT smoke was less than that from chemosynthetic or porcine muscle models.
• Organic compound concentrations in VTT smoke were below health risk limits.

Conclusions:

• VTT models produce less smoke with fewer organic compounds compared to other tested materials.
• While porcine liver smoke has fewer concerning organic compounds than some models, it contains hazardous nitriles absent in VTT smoke.
• Versatile Training Tissue models are deemed relatively safe for surgical simulation and training due to low organic compound levels.