Effects of preoperative warm-ups on veterinary medical students' performance with live dog laparoscopic ovariectomy

To determine the effect of warm-up on the performance of laparoscopic ovariectomy (LOVE) on a live dog by veterinary medical students.

Randomized experimental, post-test only, control group design.

A total of 15 fourth-year veterinary students with prior training in basic laparoscopy.

Participants were randomly assigned to Group NW (n = 8), who did no warm-up, or Group W (n = 7), who engaged in a 30-min preoperative warm-up using a laparoscopic simulator and a laparoscopic video game (Underground). Laparoscopic surgical procedures were video-recorded and evaluated by a blinded board-certified surgeon (MF). The duration of surgery was recorded, and the student's performance was scored using a previously validated rubric. Outcomes were compared between groups with two-sample t-tests. The a priori significance was set to 0.05 (α = 0.05).

The duration of surgery was 20 min less in Group W (M = 63; range: 58-86) compared to Group NW (M = 84; range: 58-86; $p=9:200$ ). Students in Group W achieved higher scores (M = 138.4; range: 122-152) than those in Group NW (M = 121.5; range: 106-130; $p=27:1000$ ).

Veterinary students who did warm-up on a laparoscopic simulator and laparoscopic video game just before LOVE effectively decreased surgical time and increased efficiency.

This study is consistent with the findings in human medicine, supports the use of warm-up exercises in surgical trainee programs before performing laparoscopic surgeries on live animals.