Purpose
Google Glass (Google Inc., Mountain View, CA), with its point-of-view (POV)-style recording, has the potential to revolutionize the field of medical education, allowing trainees to see the various steps of surgical procedures directly from viewpoint of the operating surgeon. Unlike intraocular surgery, which benefits from the video documenting capabilities of modern ophthalmic surgical microscopes, scleral buckling surgery has traditionally been difficult to record, limiting access to a valuable educational modality. We report our experience using the Google Glass to record scleral buckling surgery.
Methods
We recorded and subsequently reviewed both still images and videos of 3 primary scleral buckling surgeries. We qualitatively assessed the ability of the recorded material to document key steps in the scleral buckling procedure, noting overall image quality as well as factors limiting image quality.
Results
Google Glass was effective in recording the operative field during each step of the scleral buckling procedure. Still images (Figure 1) and video clips (Video, Supplemental) obtained provided sufficient detail to demonstrate the key steps of the procedure. Optimal image quality was limited by several factors including over- or under- illumination and lack of magnification.
Conclusions
The field of medical education has benefited from new technologies that allow trainees to visualize complex surgical procedures from the viewpoint of the primary surgeon. The recent introduction of Google Glass extends this capability to surgical procedures that do not require an operating microscope and have traditionally been difficult to record for the purposes of medical education. Although limited by lighting and magnification, the point of view recordings created using Google Glass during retinal buckling surgery are able to document the key steps of the scleral buckling procedure, providing a valuable tool for surgical teaching.