Game Skill: Can You Select Your Surgeon by His Video Game Skills?

Frank Zappa once said: A mind is like a parachute. It doesn’t work if it is not open. Recently we read the book: I Live in the Future and Here Is How It Works by Nick Bilton. He explores why your world, work, and brain are being creatively disrupted. He includes a great example of the use of video game skills. Here is an example of the research Bilton uses to illustrate his thesis.

Learn The game skill.

The next time you have surgery; ask your surgeon if he or she played video games in the past. Here’s why: A few years ago, researchers quizzed more than thirty surgeons and surgical residents on their video-game habits, identifying those who played video games frequently, those who played less frequently, and those who hardly played at all.

Adventure skill games.

Then they put all the surgeons through a laparoscopic surgery simulator, in which thin instruments akin to extremely long chopsticks are inserted into one or more small incisions through the skin along with a small camera that is inserted into an additional small opening. Minimally invasive surgery like this frequently is used for gallbladder removal, gynecologic procedures, and other procedures that once involved major cutting and stitching and could require hours on an operating table.