Effects of Optical See-Through Head-Mounted Display Use for Simulated Laparoscopic Surgery

This study investigated the influence of using optical see-through head-mounted displays (OST-HMDs) as a replacement for conventional monitors for an extended duration, as required for laparoscopic surgery. We developed the experiment scenario including two displays (surgical field and patient vitals) in three different combinations of the HMD and conventional monitors. An experiment was conducted to compare the task performance, situation awareness, physical discomfort, and perceived workload in the three different display settings. From this study, it was shown that even though the OST-HMD resulted in higher physical discomfort and lower self-perceived performance rating, the surgical task performance, and situation awareness were not worse, and in some conditions even better than conventional monitors. The main obstacle to using OST-HMDs to replace conventional monitors in laparoscopic surgery would be the weight of the HMDs and the head discomfort caused by wearing them for a long time.