Assessing Rapid Visual Perception in Medical Students Trained in Ultrasound

TL;DR

Medical students who trained in ultrasound and practiced outside class improved their ability to quickly identify ultrasound images.

Contribution

An inexpensive method to assess rapid visual perception in ultrasound students and evidence that extracurricular practice enhances expertise.

Findings

Accuracy in identifying ultrasound images more than doubled with extracurricular engagement.

A low-cost method was developed to assess rapid visual perception in ultrasound students.

Formal training combined with informal practice leads to greater visual expertise in ultrasound.

Abstract

Rapid visual perception of ultrasound (US) images was compared between 1st- and 2nd-year medical students at 2 days or 6 months following ultrasound training, respectively. Briefly, US images were presented for 0.2 s, after which, participants were asked to identify the anatomical structure. Modest accuracy was observed among both cohorts. However, accuracy more than doubled for students that engaged with US outside their formal training. Our study demonstrates: 1) an inexpensive method of assessing rapid visual perception in students of US; and 2) that a combination of formal training and extracurricular engagement leads to greater visual expertise for conventional US.

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