The iLapSurg app acts as a video library for laparoscopic surgeries.
The goal of the app is to provide access to educational videos describing and showing laparoscopic surgical procedures in fields of General Surgery, Gynecology, Urology, etc. Currently, the app has 21 videos available created by the developers of the app. However, they plan to continue to add more and are accepting videos from other surgeons across the world.
User Interface
The app opens up with a list of the current videos that are available. The title of the app is listed along with a screen shot from the video. A huge flaw of this app is that although some videos are free, others cost anywhere from $1.99-$5.99 to download. For most users, paying for each individual video will make the app not worth the information it provides.
The videos can also be sorted by category and by author. Currently, there are limited categories that are covered by the app, but as mentioned, there are plans to continue to add more videos.
Once the video is chosen, a screen comes up with more details about the video. Unfortunately, the details for each video is lacking and usually just include a paraphrasing of the title.
The videos can be played in both portrait or landscape views. The videos include a quick description of the patient and then an explanation of the surgery as it is performed.
Healthcare workers that would benefit from the app
- Medical students and residents who want to learn about particular surgeries could benefit from this app.
- Price
- Free to download, In-app purchases for additional videos ranging from $1.99-$5.99
- Likes
- Potential to be a great app for students and residents to review surgical procedures if there were more videos and the videos were included for free
- Dislikes
- Limited number of videos and specialties covered
- Additional videos need to be purchased
- Very short descriptions of the surgeries
- Overall
- The iLapSurg app has the potential to be a way to share knowledge about laparoscopic procedures.
- However, the app is fairly new and has very limited content.
- In addition, most of the content requires an in-app purchase.
- The app also does not include much information about each video which would be useful prior to purchasing videos to watch.
- Overall Score
- 2
- User Interface
Easy to use. Would be better if there was more information about each video and if the main screen started with the categories rather than the list of every video.
- Multimedia Usage
The app includes good quality videos, which make it very easy to appreciate the surgery.
- Price
Free with in-app purchases of videos.
- Real World Applicability
Currently, there are not enough videos for this app to be useful and it may not be useful if the app requires purchase for each video.
- Device Used For Review
iPhone 5
- Available for DownloadiPhone
