Evaluation of a training course on open vascular surgical techniques in aortoiliac pathology - 5 years of experience

INTRODUCTION: The aim of this prospective study was to assess the efficacy of a vascular surgery course (2008–2012), and to verify the viability and the feasibility of vascular anastomoses. MATERIAL AND METHOD: The vascular surgical techniques performed simultaneously on pigs were: enlargement prosthetic angioplasty, abdominal aortic interposition graft and aortoiliac bypass. The endpoints of the study were the surgical skills and the technical quality, assessed on a scale ranging from 1 (satisfactory) to 3 (very good) for our participants. RESULTS: A significant improvement in vascular surgical skills tasks was observed during the study years and we also found a significant statistical association between the quality of the suture and the surgical technique used (Kendall coefficient=0.71, p=0.001<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Our course contributed to the improvement of the technical vascular surgical skills of the operator teams, reproducing in vivo, in pigs, the intraoperative environment of human patients.