Intraoperative Telementoring: A New Lens through the Technological Revolution

Given the pace of change in technology, guiding principles in technology design of health care solutions have been largely supported by increasing wireless data transmission bandwidth and growing computational power. These principles have introduced a new medium to approach surgery. The fast pace of innovation in surgical technology coupled with the projected shortage of up to 120,000 surgeons by 2030, create a fertile ground for the implementation of telementoring into the surgical arena to learn and transfer new surgical skills in surgical laparoscopy procedures. (Ponsky, 2014). The present study aims to review the development of surgical telementoring (ST) as a response to the high rate of technical innovation to learn and transfer new surgical skills in surgical laparoscopy procedures. While the research returned a favorable level of evidence to support improved perception [benefit] of surgical telementoring (ST), we did not find any literature-based evidence that compared ST to cost, time, or quality outcomes. However, one study showed a 30% reduction in the duration of a telementored session when introducing telestration, which enabled the mentor with real-time ability to draw illustrations on the live image(s) to identify an anatomical landmark and identify places of dissection (Antoniou et al, 2012). Despite the limited evidence, this review defines ST, identifies the mentors and mentees, provides the most common use cases of ST, and provides the reported benefits and financial aspects of ST