University of Miyazaki

Operating room (OR) practice often induces anxiety in nursing students because of its highly specialized environment. Innovative preparatory education is essential to enhance students' emotional readiness and spatial understanding prior to clinical exposure. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of 360-degree video materials in improving emotional and spatial preparedness among nursing students before and after an OR practicum.

This study was conducted in University of Miyazaki and Kyushu University Hospital, and included 61 third-year nursing students undergoing OR practicums between September 2024 and January 2025. Students were sequentially assigned to a 360-degree video group (n = 22) or a control group (n = 25). Emotional responses (interest, enjoyment, excitement, fear, and anxiety), OR practicu-mrelated stress, and spatial comprehension (patient flow, nurse workflow, and equipment layout) were assessed before the practicum, after video viewing, and after the practicum.

No significant differences were observed between the groups at baseline. After viewing the 360-degree video, the proportion of students who reported interest, enjoyment, and excitement increased significantly. These positive emotional responses were enhanced after the practicum. The proportion of students who reported anxiety (before the practicum: 68.1 %; after viewing: 50.0 %; after the practicum: 22.7 %; P = 0.002) significantly decreased following exposure to the video and continued to decrease after the practicum. Empathy toward patients improved progressively (before the practicum: 77.3 %; after viewing: 90.0 %: after the practicum: 100.0 %; P = 0.04). Spatial comprehension improved significantly after video exposure and continued to increase after the practicum.

Integrating 360-degree video into preparatory education effectively enhanced nursing students' emotional readiness and spatial understanding of OR practicums. This approach may contribute to reducing pre-practicum anxiety and facilitate deeper engagement in clinical education.

We recently investigated a death involving a drowning victim found in a slow-flowing part of a river with the right hand clutching a branch of bamboo growing along the bank. Such hand findings have traditionally been ascribed to cadaveric spasm, supposedly representing a stiffening of the muscles that occurs immediately after death. However, another persuasive opinion is that cadaveric spasm is a myth. A rational explanation for our case might thus be that the hand became flaccid immediately after death, but the bamboo branch remained close to the fingers under slow flow, and the subsequent onset of rigor mortis caused the hand to “grasp” the bamboo branch. However, another report of a drowning case described a blade of grass clutched in a hand despite a strong flow in an irrigation canal, which had swept the deceased 5.5 km downstream and stripped off all clothing. That case was difficult to explain without cadaveric spasm, and 2 animal studies have also shown the development of rigor mortis in a small proportion of animals immediately after death. We thus believe that cadaveric spasm deserves further consideration and should not yet be ruled out.

Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) has been used in veterinary medicine for cerebral infarctions and degenerative diseases in recent years. Defining normal values for the apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) and fractional anisotropy (FA) to detect lesions is challenging because these values depend on anatomical differences in the spinal cord, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine model, magnetic field strength, and measurement protocol. Shannon entropy is the average amount of information and is a measure of the variability or complexity, of distributed numbers. The purpose of this study is to evaluate whether Shannon entropy can serve as a useful new indicator for interpreting the structural integrity of the canine spinal cord. We used six beagle dogs with no spinal cord disease, as confirmed by neurological examination and magnetic resonance imaging. We calculated the respective values for the cervical and thoracolumbar spinal cord under the 3 T magnetic field. The ADC and FA values (mean ± standard error) of the cervical spinal cord were 1.11 ± 0.05 × 10^-3 mm²/s and 0.64 ± 0.02. The thoracolumbar spinal cord had values of 1.16 ± 0.04 × 10^-3 mm²/s and 0.58 ± 0.02. The ADC and FA values of the spinal cord reflected anatomical differences, and no fixed normal values were observed for the entire spinal cord. Shannon entropy was 5.67 ± 0.45. No significant differences were observed in the values at any intervertebral level. These results suggest that Shannon entropy is more useful than the ADC and FA values. Shannon entropy may be able to differentiate between normal tissue and lesions, independent of various MRI conditions.