AUTHOR=Yi Xuxia , Wang Gang , Zhang Nai , Si Weixin , Lv Jianping 

TITLE=A novel simulator-based checklist for evaluating residents' competence in cerebral angiography in China

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neurology

VOLUME=Volume 14 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neurology/articles/10.3389/fneur.2023.1122257

DOI=10.3389/fneur.2023.1122257

ISSN=1664-2295

ABSTRACT=Background: Nowadays, with the fast-increasing demand for neuro-endovascular therapy, surgeons in this field are in urgent need. Unfortunately, there is still no formal skill assessment in neuro-endovascular therapy in China.
Methods: We used a Delphi method to design a newly objective checklist for standards of cerebrovascular angiography in China and evaluated its validity and reliability. 19 neuro-residents with no interventional experience and 19 neuro-endovascular surgeons from 2 centers (Guangzhou and Tianjin) were recruited, they were divided into two groups, Residents and Surgeons. Residents completed a simulation-based cerebrovascular angiography operation training before assessment. Assessments were under live and video record forms with two tools: the existing GRS (global rating scale) of Endovascular Performance and the new checklist. 
Results: The average scores of Residents were significantly increased after training in 2 centers (p<0.05). There is good consistency between GRS and the checklist (p=0.856). Intra-rater reliability (spearman’s rho) of the checklist was >0.9, the same result was also observed in raters between different centers, and different assessment forms (p<0.001, rho>0.9). The reliability of the checklist was higher than that of the GRS (ours Kendall’s Harmonious Coefficient is 0.849 while GRS’ is 0.684). 
Conclusion: The newly developed checklist appears reliable and valid for evaluating the technical performance of cerebral angiography and differentiating between trained and untrained trainees’ performance well. For its efficiency, our method has been proven to be a feasible tool for resident angiography examination in certification nationwide.