Resources for Operative Neurosurgical Education Among Trainees in the Philippines

Operative neurosurgical skills education is a vital part of neurosurgical training, and these skills are usually obtained through operating room experience and supplemented by textbooks and other resources. We aimed to determine the resources used by trainees in the Philippines, both prior to and after the onset of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

An online survey was sent to neurosurgical trainees in the Philippines from January to March 2021. Data on demographics, educational resources used, and weekly hours spent on each were collected, for both the pre- and post-coronavirus disease 2019 periods.

A total of 37 neurosurgical trainees (60% response rate) participated in the survey. Most respondents were female (70%), in their senior levels (58%), and undergoing training in a public institution (65%). The main resources for operative neurosurgical education were operative experience, online academic resources, and neurosurgical textbooks. After the onset of the pandemic, the overall time spent decreased to 61.2 hours/week from 67.7 hours/week, with a significant reduction in the hours spent on operative experience (27.3 vs. 21.3 hours/week, P < 0.0001) and a significant increase in the time spent on webinars (0 vs. 3.2 hours/week, P < 0.0001) and online resources as a whole (14.9 vs. 16.4 hours/week, P = 0.0003).

Operative experience, online academic resources, and neurosurgical textbooks were the main resources for operative neurosurgical education among trainees in the Philippines. After the onset of the pandemic, the hours spent on operative experience decreased and online academic resources increased significantly. New avenues of neurosurgical education, particularly webinars, also became available locally.