CLINICAL CHALLENGE
As the COVID-19 pandemic smolders on, learners in medicine continue to face significant barriers to accruing essential clinical exposure because of social distancing, preceptor availability, and fluctuating patient volumes. Clinical educators must innovate to continue demonstrating hands-on skills in the most efficient, easily accessible manner. Various apparatuses have been utilized to record video of hands-on procedural skills for teaching, but these can be cumbersome and expensive and do not enable the demonstrator to confirm and adjust proper framing in real time, hands-free.
SOLUTION
The smartphone hanger is a comfortable, simple, easily sanitized tool for recording hands-on skills (Figures 1 and 2); it can be made from a wire lab coat hanger in under 15 minutes (Video 1, https://journals.lww.com/jdnaonline/pages/videogallery.aspx?autoPlay=false&video). It puts the clinician in complete control of desired video framing in real time without obstructing the wearer's view and keeps the assistant free of additional recording-related tasks. The clinician may take photographs or start and stop video recording without breaking sterile technique by using voice commands. All modern smartphones feature free video editing software that enables the demonstrator to record voice-overs, add captions, and remove patient privacy-sensitive portions as needed. The quality of the end product is sufficient for acceptance into a peer-reviewed journal (Young & Zumwalt, 2022).
The smartphone hanger represents a free and easily accessible means of rapidly disseminating high-quality, The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996-compliant skills tutorials during a time when learner access to in-person hands-on dermatology mentorship is unpredictable.
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