The CD-ROM and the training urologists

The rapid increase of knowledge in medical sciences as well as the progress ive specialization demand for new approaches in training and education incl uding the application of innovative technologies, Combining a variety of di fferent media (video-ware, audioware, text, animations, picture collections , graphs etc.) the CD-ROM represents an ideal medium for the presentation o f complex and multifacetted contents. The interactive contextualization of the contents improves the knowledge transfer and seems to be superior to cl assical educational media. Our own experience includes the production of 3 CD-ROMs. The first part discusses the possibilities of the visualization of scientific medical findings by means of creating a 3 D computer model of t he anatomy of the distal urinary tract. The experience gained here was used to produce another two CDs covering the topic of the Benign Prostrate-Hype rplasia. The most recent CD applies a wide variety of contemporary computer -based techniques of visualization to present the basics, the differential diagnosis and the medical therapy of the BPH syndrome as well as several di fferent endoscopic surgical methods.