Purpose of the Review
We will examine Touch Surgery app to explore any potential uses it may have for medical students and professionals.
Introduction
2013 has been a major year for medical simulations.
Several new apps were released attempting to provide a closer user experience to that of a real OR. One such medical simulator is Touch Surgery, an app iMedicalApps previously reviewed in its iOS form. According to our iOS review, Touch Surgery is the first time that we have seen a decent surgical simulator on a mobile device. This time we will sail forth to find out whether the experience is equally satisfying for Android users.
User Interface
One of the first things we notice upon launching Touch Surgery is its minimalistic user interface. The layout is clear and utilizes light colors to convey the feeling of ease of use. The app lets you choose from a list of 8 operations such as cholecystectomy or appendectomies. In order to decrease the installation time of the app these learning modules are not available right away, rather they must be downloaded. Luckily there’s no additional cost and they are available for free.
Operations are presented with two options: Learn or Test. Learn provides step by step information on how the procedure is done in a simplified manner. The simulation part requires the user to interact with the app by dragging a finger across the screen to complete specific instructions. As the user advances through the steps 3D animations represent the actions that they are performing. These animations are beautiful and are a nice touch to help understand what’s going on.
Whenever we feel we have mastered the simulation we can test ourselves through a simulation with no instructions at all. Depending on how well we did we’ll get a score which will be uploaded to a leaderboard. It’s a shame Touch Surgery didn’t take more advantage of this gamification aspect as it could have made the whole experience even more engaging.
Price
- Free
Likes
- Excellent graphics
- Trustworthy information
Dislikes
- Could use more game elements
Healthcare providers that would benefit from the app
- Medical students, patient educators, physicians
Conclusion
- It’s refreshing to find an app such as Touch Surgery. The developers did a wonderful job of creating a learning experience that’s reliable and entertaining at the same time.
Type of device used to review app–Motorola Droid 3
App version– 3.02
Rating: (1 to 5 stars): 5/5
- User interface – 5. UI is simple
- Multimedia usage – 5. Images are low quality
- Price – 5. Amazing quality for free
- Real world applicability -5. Excellent for students
