First in the Baltics to introduce video cameras in dental training
Rīga Stradiņš University's Faculty of Dentistry is the first in the Baltics to introduce 18 special video cameras in preclinical dental training. The head-mounted cameras allow the filming and recording of manipulations performed by dental students, which helps local and foreign students acquire the required professional competency at a higher level of excellence.
The individual work of each student during classes is stored in a file. After class each student is granted access to his personal video file, making it possible to undergo analysis of the study process together with the teacher or individually.
The new study method with head-mounted cameras make it possible to devote more attention to details which are of utmost importance for dentistry as a profession where each treatment activity has particular significance and is to be performed with absolute precision.
Analysis of improvable skills will be a new form of training and teaching and is highly welcomed by students in the contemporary world of technologies.
The recently-acquired “Futudent” technology enables video recording and online display of images on the screen from the user’s perspective. The camera forms images by means of optical increase thereof in approximation. The camera is mounted on the student’s head and ensures visible practical skills acquisition process. Before introduction of this solution one could evaluate the end result and individual, already completed stages of students’ work. The camera allows to continuously follow the work on screens placed above students’ work stations, i.e. the lecturer will have the possibility to track the process of student’s work. This will help in acquiring the necessary dentistry skills much faster and more precisely.
The implemented technology will also be of use for improving study materials, supplementing them with video files and real clinical cases. Similarly, each teacher will be given the opportunity to make his own video recordings while working with patients and to subsequently demonstrate such to students. This will highly contribute to the acquired theoretical knowledge, increase the availability of practical studies and is a great opportunity to learn from the experience of the teaching staff at the RSU Faculty of Dentistry.
