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Study: Wii improves simulated surgery

NEWS IN BRIEF — Posted March 3, 2008

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Kanav Kahol, PhD, assistant professor in Arizona State University's department of biomedical informatics, and Marshall Smith, MD, PhD, a surgeon at the Banner Good Samaritan Medical Center in Phoenix, found that surgical residents performed better in simulated surgery after playing on the Nintendo Wii console.

They credit the Wii's "wiimote" system which allows users to direct on-screen action from a wireless handheld remote by moving their hands, rather than only pressing buttons. The two are now working on Wii software that will simulate actual surgical procedures.

This follows research released in 2004 finding that video-game-playing surgeons outperformed non-gaming surgeons in speed and lack of errors in surgery. That research cited video games' ability to improve hand-eye coordination.

Note: This item originally appeared at http://www.ama-assn.org/amednews/2008/03/03/bibf0303.htm.

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