Author: MSk Lab

MSk Lab – January 2014 Update

The MSkLab is taking part in an offshoot of the highly acclaimed and successful TEDMED meetings. We are one of the participants taking part in the off-shoot called The Cell, which is being held at the Royal Albert Hall and Alexander Fleming Building (Imperial). It is to showcase, and centred round, innovative healthcare technologies. Professor Cobb and Mr Gupte will speaking at the event. Further details can be found at: http://www.tedmedlivelondon.com/the-cell-patricipants/4578930790

 

The Great Debate (International Orthopaedic Conference) run by the MSk Lab is joining forces with a large European orthopeadic conference EFORT and running sessions within the main programme. 4th and 5th June at ExCEL.

 

New edition of the Lab Report is now out: http://www1.imperial.ac.uk/msklab/news_blog/

Zoe Williams
Public Engagement and Patient Involvement Manager
MSk Lab

 

The Great Debate 2013 – Raising Standards in Hip and Knee Arthroplasty

On the 20th and 21st June, the MSk Lab ran the Great Debate for the second time after taking the gauntlet on from industry who had organised it in previous years. Professor Cobb is one of the founders of the meeting 7 years ago and chaired the event since its inception – so last year it was great to finally bring it in house.

The Great Debate is a two day interactive conference which gives the attendees opportunities to vote on topical issues in hip and knee arthroplasty, as well as question the faculty on controversial themes in the session debates. Last year the time of year it was held changed as well as a move of venue to The Mermaid Conference Centre. 2013 also brought some changes – the avatar/logo was given a new lease of life and breakout sessions run by industry were added each day. We had the support of 19 Industry sponsors, a 25 strong international faculty with renowned speakers joining us from; Australia, USA, Germany, Italy and the UK.

“The big issues debated this year included hip bearings, and partial knee replacements competing with top of the range total knees. In the hip bearing debate, ceramics were clear winners, although interestingly resurfacing is not dead. Almost 80% of the surgeons thought there was still a place for the procedure, and accepted the functional gains that it brought.

In the knee debate, huge interest was found in the compartmental knee approach, with most speakers expressing dissatisfaction at the joint registry and its inability to report poorly functioning but unrevised total knees”

Having almost finished dotting all the t’s and crossing all the I’s to finalise this year’s event, we may just have time for a cuppa before starting to plan The Great Debate 2014. With such good feedback – how could we not!

“I have attended three times since 2006, I think this is the best joint arthroplasty meeting in the UK”

Tweet us or follow us @Great_Debate_UK, which we will be using to try and keep some debate going, accept suggestions as to topics for discussion, and provide details of who to expect to see, where and when in 2014.

Zoe Williams
Public Engagement and Patient Involvement Manager
MSk Lab

Holographic Assisted Lecturing in Orthopaedics


Dr Kapil Sugand graduated from Imperial College in 2010 with an intercalated BSc in Surgery and Anaesthesia. Alongside his clinical training, Dr Sugand is currently pursuing a PhD in surgical trauma simulation and educational technology under the supervision of Mr Gupte and Professor Cobb in the MSk Lab. As part of his studies, he is currently conducting research with multi-disciplinary team within a number of multimedia modalities to train safer surgeons and to ultimately enhance patient safety. He is the Co-Founder and Co-chair of the Holography Assisted Medical Learning and E-Teaching (HAMLET) group which has created quite a media buzz due to the innovative ground breaking research and has been covered by:

“It is a really interesting and exciting project to be working on, not only because of the academics involved, but also due to the scope this application has if proved a valuable and reliable teaching channel. The initial study was conducted on students, giving them an enhanced learning experience from which objective and subjective feedback was collated to assess the impact and value of holography-assisted lecturing. It will be interesting to see if this new learning experience will actually become the ‘gold-standard’ in levels of teaching/presenting.”, Dr Sugand commented.

The team are not just looking at the impact this has on graduate teaching but how it can be used in the wider medical world too. Holograms have the power to visually communicate with greater immersive impact than other presentation modalities so it may facilitate patients being able to understand the disease process and management options more effectively. Something to watch for the future; but we could see holography used as a means of patient engagement, improving compliance to management and being part of the ‘pre-habilitation’ phase of enhanced recovery programmes.

Zoe Williams
Public Engagement and Patient Involvement Manager
MSk Lab