We thank the editorial reviewers for their thoughtful input. As highlighted in the editorial comment, the reality of physical distancing thrust upon us by the COVID-19 pandemic, has compelled the urology community to develop creative methods of online education. While many trainees have missed out on clinical experiences during this time, the development of virtual education has become an invaluable resource, the archives of which, can be of benefit to trainees for years to come.1 We suspect the next step in this new era of virtual education is to create regional collaboratives whereby residents can “grow their urologic social network” in meaningful ways as they start their training. We ultimately intend to transition our boot camp to an online platform, thereby extending its reach outside of the state of New Jersey. Although a major benefit of our boot camp was inter-institutional networking, we are hopeful that trainees will still connect through video-based conferencing and social media until it is safe to resume meeting in person.
Footnotes
Financial Disclosure: Sammy E. Elsamra is a consultant and proctor for Intuitive Surgical. The other authors report no declarations of interest.
Funding Support: None.
References
- 1.Tabakin AL, Patel HV, Singer EA. Lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic: a call for a national video-based curriculum for urology residents. J Surg Educ. 2021;78:324–326. doi: 10.1016/j.jsurg.2020.07.013. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]