Proficiency and Retention of Five Clinical Veterinary Skills Using Multipurpose Reusable Canine Manikins versus Live...

Area of Science:

• Veterinary Medical Education
• Surgical Simulation
• Animal Husbandry

Background:

• Simulation offers a safe and ethical alternative to live animal use in veterinary training.
• Existing veterinary simulators are often single-purpose and lack validation.
• Need for cost-effective, versatile training tools in veterinary education.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate canine training manikins for essential veterinary clinical skills.
• To compare the efficacy of manikin-based versus live-animal training for veterinary students.
• To assess initial skill acquisition and short-term retention in veterinary trainees.

Main Methods:

• Canine manikins were constructed from readily available materials to simulate procedures.
• Undergraduate veterinary students were randomized into manikin-training or live-animal-training groups.
• Skills assessed included fine needle aspiration, venipuncture, catheterization, and cystocentesis, with blinded evaluations.

Main Results:

• No significant differences in skill performance scores were observed between the manikin and live-animal groups.
• Both immediate post-training assessment and 6-week retention scores were comparable across groups.
• The developed manikins effectively facilitated the learning of multiple clinical procedures.

Conclusions:

• Low-cost canine manikins are a valid tool for teaching fundamental veterinary clinical skills.
• Manikin-based training yields comparable initial proficiency and short-term skill retention to live-animal training.
• This simulation method provides an ethical and effective alternative for veterinary education.