Incorporating the sense of smell into patient and haptic surgical simulators.

It is widely recognized that the sense of smell plays an important role in the field of medicine. The sense of smell not only assists the physician in the diagnosis of certain disorders, but it also plays a surgical role as well. Historically, learning this skill was mostly contingent upon some level of clinical exposure to medically related odors. The advent of computerized scent production devices could change this. This article proposes a surgical simulation model that incorporates olfactory technologies into existing patient and haptic surgical simulators. If incorporated into virtual educational settings such as these, computerized scent production devices could be used not only as a novel way to enhance the virtual experience, but also as a way for medical students to begin to recognize the important role that the sense of smell plays during both diagnosis and surgery.