The influence of musical experience on laparoscopic surgical skill performance: an original investigation and literature review.

BACKGROUND

As the needs and curricula of surgical residencies evolve, recent studies have focused on identifying factors that may be related to faster and more efficient surgical skill acquisition, such as experience with playing video games, sports, and other dexterous activities. The aim of this study was to elucidate the relationship between instrumental musical experience and laparoscopic surgical skill performance as well as to provide an overview of the available literature on this topic.

METHODS

A query from database inception to January 2023 of the PubMed database for literature discussing the association of musical experience and surgical skills was conducted. One hundred and twelve publications were sorted for relevance, yielding 16 included studies. The details of these studies were organized in a table and further analyzed. Study participants answered several questions regarding their personal instrumental musical experience and rotated through two minimally invasive surgery (MIS) skills stations. Participants received a score for each station based on level of performance. Descriptive statistics as well as non-parametric analyses and Spearman's correlations were calculated when appropriate to determine any associations between musical experience and laparoscopic surgical skill performance.

RESULTS

One hundred individuals participated in the study. Fifty-one of the participants indicated that they played at least one musical instrument, and twelve (9.0%) of these individuals played more than one instrument. There was no statistically significant difference or correlation in scores between individuals that played an instrument and those that did not (p > 0.05). Playing a greater number of instruments did not significantly correlate with increased performance (p > 0.05). There was also no statistically significant difference or correlation in scores within the group that played instruments based on instrument type or number of years playing an instrument (p > 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

Experience playing musical instruments did not confer an advantage in MIS skills tested in the present study.