"Magic glasses" let the viewers "Virtual reality"

July 12, the transmission room located in Building 6 of our hospital was bustling and filled. Young doctors and medical students from liver transplantation related disciplines were here in our hospital to watch carefully a live broadcast of a pediatric living donor liver transplantation surgery by Qiang Xia, Vice President of our hospital and director of department of liver surgery. Different from the past, this live broadcast incorporated the most advanced virtual reality (VR) technology to display the surgical panorama. Just wearing a pair of special VR glasses and installing a live APP in mobile phone, no matter where they are, the viewers can all virtually observe the clear stereoscopic perspective and key details of the whole operation. It is also the country's first use of 3D VR technology in live broadcast of pediatric liver transplantation surgery, marking the medical education in our hospital has entered a new era of high technology.

This time the protagonist is a pediatric liver transplantation team led by Professor Qiang Xia. They are tensely engaged a pro-donor liver transplantation for a child of an ordinary peasant family from Weinan Country in Baishui City of Shaanxi Province. Because children pro-donor liver transplantation is between children and adults, the biggest technical problem to face is how to connect the adult blood vessels with the blood vessels of the child, and how to match the child's organs with adult organ. It requires high surgical skills. At the same time, taking into account the child's future growth factors, the kind of seam and the method of sewing, are also pivotal issues for the success of surgery and the prognosis of child in future. At the national and even global scale, Qiang Xia’s team can represent the highest level of pediatric living donor liver transplantation. The experiences have been accumulated for many years by Qiang Xia, which are difficult for others to learn about just through listening. Therefore, to observe surgery is the most effective method for the training of young doctors, and VR technology can excellently solve this problem. Technicians can simply collect 3D camera signals in surgical site, to distribute the surgery scene and the pictures of surgical field in the operating room to the front end of VR glasses in the transmission room by setting the broadcast servers and transmission equipments. Then the viewers could vividly feel and learn surgery through immersive clear broadcast. Through live VR technology, so many young standardized training doctors and students who can’t observe firsthand in the operating room, virtually observe clear stereoscopic perspective and key details of the whole operation to gain experience and growth for the benefit of more children, through this high-tech means, no matter where they are.

VR is an abbreviation of Virtual Reality, refers to creation of a new human-computer interaction by computer and the latest sensor technology. It combines computer graphics technology, computer simulation technology, sensor technology, display technology and other science and technology to create a virtual information environment in the multidimensional information space, enabling users to have a sense of immersion immersive, as well as ability to interact with the environment to help inspire ideas. In the health field, VR technology is mainly used for the training of doctors, patient education, drug mechanism presentations and so on.

According to Qiang Xia, the medical profession need for lifelong learning, while the learning objects are not repeatable with large differences in characteristics, so the extent of carefulness to observe the surgery is highly demanding. Now, with the help of VR technology, even the bodies of the viewers are thousands of miles away, they can also clearly see the whole process of surgery, which is fully consistent with the surgeon's perspective, just like standing at the surgeon position in an operating room. They can see not only the detail of each step throughout the surgery and the corresponding operating skills, but also the tacit fit between doctors and nurses, the surgeon and assistant surgeon, as well as the surgeon and anesthesiologist. Qiang Xia also said that conventional surgery broadcast could only see the image of the operative field, but now the timely conversion of the panorama in operating room and the pictures in surgical field can help observers to grasp and understand the difficult surgical techniques as a whole. In the past, there can be no more than ten doctors in the operating room at the same time to observe and learn for such a surgery, but now VR technology allows such a surgical procedure to show to more doctors in a more clear way. The junior doctors and medical students, who have no opportunity to enter operating room and learn, are possible to observe and learn immersive surgery getting rid of the restrictions of time and space. Qiang Xia said: "For liver transplantation doctors and beginners, the application of VR technology not only enhance the watch experience of liver transplantation, but also is a milestone in the process of teaching and promotion of liver transplantation surgery."

A young doctor at the scene said excitedly: "In the past due to various constraints, we rarely have the opportunity to watch liver transplantation surgery by the top international experts even if in a video broadcast. Also because of the limitations of the camera angle, it is difficult to get clear details of the various operations and cooperation. Now, with VR technology, we will be able to watch the perspective and vision which are fully synchronized with the surgical team. The details of each operation can be seen clearly, that has a great help to enhance the level of our operation. "It is reported that, under normal circumstances, development of a qualified liver transplantation doctor may need at least ten years of time and duration of exercise, because of the shortage of teaching resources as well as opportunities for clinical practice. Our hospital always attached importance to medical education. The quality of theory teaching and clinical training of medical students here is always at the forefront of the city. In 2010, the hospital became one of the first 39 Hospitals for Standardized Training of Residents in Shanghai. After years of practice, it has formed a sound management evaluation and incentive system that also received approval by Ministry of Health in a special investigation in 2012. An article titled as "One team two systems residency standardized training in Shanghai Renji hospital", was promoted to all the health bureaus across the country in the form of presentation by the public hospital reform coordination group office of Ministry of Health at that time. Now, with the gradual introduction of new technologies such as live VR into medical education, efficiency and popularity of medical teaching in our hospital will be greatly increased. We believe that in the future, medical students and junior doctors will effectively shorten the learning time to more solidly master the skills and knowledge, so as to benefit more patients. (Reporter Haoning Wang and Shan Tan / Translator Weiwei Zhang)