"PhacoTracking": an evolving paradigm in ophthalmic surgical training.

Motion analysis has been validated as a tool to evaluate surgical skill. We investigated a novel computer vision-based tool for the evaluation of surgical movements during cataract surgery. A prospective cohort analysis of 2 groups was performed. Ten videos of junior surgeons (ie, those with <200 cases) and 10 videos of senior surgeons (ie, those with >1000 cases) were analyzed. Movement parameters were measured over an entire procedure. Significant statistical differences were found between novice and expert surgeons for total path length (P = .002), number of movements (P = .05), and total time (P = .004). Our study has shown that computer vision-based motion analysis can be successfully applied to video recordings of cataract surgery to provide robust measurements of instrument motion. Further work needs to be done to evaluate its usefulness in training and feedback.