At the end of each academic year, the Society of Neurological Surgeons (SNS) holds an intensive, boot camp-style training session for residents who have just finished their first year of neurosurgery residency. For the seventh year in a row, Weill Cornell Medicine was designated the east coast location for the SNS Junior Resident Course.
Dr. Michael Kaplitt, who directs the neurosurgery residency program at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, oversees the annual training program with the SNS. Weill Cornell Medicine residents and faculty worked with Invited faculty from other teaching hospitals to teach and mentor this contingent of future neurosurgeons.
The two-day course consisted of 72 residents representing 40 neurosurgery programs. After one day of lectures, participants received hands-on training in the fundamentals of neurosurgery, ranging from injury simulation drills and dissection to high-tech Gamma Knife operation.
The Weill Cornell Medical College campus hosted sessions in three different locations. In the Gross Anatomy Lab, attendees learned about Gamma Knife technology, microscope basics, pumps and stimulators, and peripheral nerve anatomy using a cadaver arm. Upstairs in the Skills Acquisition and Innovation Laboratory (SAIL), residents saw a sagittal sinus injury simulation and a vessel anastomosis simulation. Next door, in the Surgical Innovations Lab, residents, under the watchful eye of faculty, practiced microsurgical techniques on silicone dummies, which immersed the residents in real-world surgical scenarios.
