Current State of the Art:
Many health profession students are inexperienced in breast examination skills. As a result, they lack confidence and can score poorly on initial breast exam tests. This has occurred in large part due to a lack of sophisticated training equipment available. Previously, students would examine silicone breasts without sensors for abnormalities. Over the past decade, however, breast simulators have been evolving. The newest models are fitted with sensors that can give students feedback on whether they're doing an exam properly or not, but are still being developed.
Disadvantages with the Current Art:
Silicone breasts, without sensors, for breast examination testing do not provide feedback as to how much pressure/force a student is applying when searching for breast abnormalities. As result, the practice equipment does not provide a student with all of the necessary feedback in order for the student to master their breast examination skills in a test environment.
Advantages of the Invention:
The invention employs force sensors and video to provide the student with real time, objective feedback of his or her exam performance in greater detail and realism than current methods. The video aspect is important. One color seeing and one infrared seeing camera are placed above the simulated anatomy (i.e. breast). These cameras provide color and infrared video streams of the student’s examination in real time. The related data (pressure and location) can also be converted to numerical models to quantify examination performance.
Patent Status: PCT Filed
Inventors: David Lind, Benjamin Lok, and Aaron Kotranza
Case Number: GHSU 2010-025