Development and Evaluation of a Reusable Self-Healing Phantom for Ultrasound-Guided Femoral Vascular Access

Purpose :: Femoral vascular access is a common and often crucial step for cardiovascular intervention. With the growing demand for treatment, increasing pressure is placed on centres to develop new technologies and train more operators. Phantoms have been shown to have positive impacts on training across multiple fields of medicine. Methods :: Using an informed selection of materials, a vascularised leg phantom was developed in collaboration with clinicians. The material properties were investigated and the ability of the phantom to withstand multiple needle punctures was examined. The phantom was then evaluated in a training workshop with 18 medical students, tracking their procedural time before and after 5 minutes of practice. In a separate evaluation, the phantom was demonstrated to 31 medical educators who provided structured feedback using a 7-question survey via a 5-point Likert scale. Results :: Material analysis showed that the phantom had a OO shore hardness of 18.0±2.2, a speed of sound of 1454±15m/s, and could recover from 18-20G needle damage within three hours. Results showed that most students improved their vascular access time by over 60\% after 5 minutes of free practice on the phantom. Most educators said that they would use this phantom for training operators before and whilst training on patients. The total material costs for this phantom were £7.87, yet medical educators valued it at £100-£500 on average. Conclusion :: The methods hereby described propose a viable solution for crafting custom vascular access phantoms for industrial manufacturers, research centres, and training centres with manufacturing capabilities, costing many times less than existing commercial solutions. The phantom was shown to have a positive impact on students, and educators reported they would use it for training. Beyond education, the realistic anatomy, physical properties, and training capabilities achieved with these simple low-cost methods could find numerous applications in academic or industrial research.