Effects of habitual physical activity on microsurgical performance

Abstract

We investigated the effect of physical activity on microsurgical performance. Forty novice candidates and 6 expert controls did a series of consecutive end-to-end microvascular anastomoses. To assess performance, we did a hand motion analysis and correlated the results with levels of habitual physical activity. Higher levels of activity in the novice candidates correlated with slower completion of anastomosis for medical students on day 1 (p=0.0035) and day 5 (p=0.0003). The same pattern was seen for postgraduate trainees on day 1 (p=0.024) and day 5 (p=0.0063). Higher level of activity also correlated with an increase in path length (total distance travelled and direction of travel) and in total movements on day 1 for medical students (p=0.016 and p=0.0021, respectively), and in total path length on day 1 for postgraduate trainees (p=0.0305).