Research NSALK

NSALK is an interdisciplinary organisation working together with NTNU ( Norwegian University of Science and Technology), FOR (The Future Operating Room), the SINTEF research group and other technology centres. This collaborative effort has produced a number of technical inventions, such as SonoDoppler and the new instrument Volargrip™.

Volargrip™ is a laparoscopic tool with a grip that can be adapted to the surgeon’s hands and fits both left-handed and right-handed surgeons. The design has been developed and tested in close cooperation between users at St. Olav’s University Hospital, university hospitals in Germany and designers from the Trondheim-based company Surgitech Norway AS.

The advisory unit is active in research on bariatric surgery and has been involved in development of new surgical treatments such as VBLOC therapy.

The use of simulators, when acquiring and maintaining practical surgical skills, makes training safer, more efficient and enables exact replication of setup for all candidates, permitting fair and reliable assessment of candidates. NSALK has several research projects related to training, validation and development of simulators.

NSALK also cooperates closely with Norwegian National Advisory Unit on Ultrasound and Image guided Therapy (www.usigt.org), through which the navigation platform “Custus X” has been developed.

Our Researchers

Cecilie Våpenstad
Researcher, PhD student

How to improve surgical safety by letting surgeons train in a risk-free environment outside of the operating room using simulators. Cecilie Våpenstad is doing research on transfer of skills from training on simulators, competancy based training and simulated patient-specific rehearsal.  

Fields of interests: Skills training in minimally invasive surgery, Medical Imaging (x-ray, ultrasound), social learning

Eivind Grong

We have executed experimental studies in which we have explored the effect of bariatric surgery on type 2 diabetes mellitus in rats. A particular area of interest has been alterations in gastrin secretion following surgery and how this affects diabetes. Simultaneously, in collaboration with Umeå University, we have quantified beta-cell mass in rat pancreata by a three-dimensional technique called optical projection tomography (OPT). As a side project, we have contributed in a study describing biochemical characteristics of human pancreatic tissue by Raman microspectroscopy.
See updated list of publications.

Arild de Vries

I do research on different experimental methods in the prevention of postoperative intraabdominal adhesion formation. Sofar one paper is published [1] and two manuscripts are planned for publication. In addition i am writing my PhD thesis at the moment.

References

1. de Vries A, Marvik R, Kuhry E (2013) To perform operative procedures in an optimized local atmosphere: can it reduce post-operative adhesion formation? Int J Surg 11:1118-1122