Background:
Verify the claimed skills in intracorporeal suturing in expert laparoscopic surgeons, and the development of these abilities during a 21 hours advanced laparoscopic course.

Material and Methods:
20 attendants with previous laparoscopic experience were included. On the first day, surgeons performed two intracorporeal simple sutures: P1 at the beginning and P2 at the end of the 4hour hands-on simulator session. Similarly, and on porcine model, a third simple laparoscopic suture was completed (P3). Total completion time was registered. Percentage errors were also listed.

Result:
Average time for P1 was 3.87±1.53minutes. Only one attendant was incapable of completing the simple suture. Average time for P2 for all the attendants was 3.32±1.09minutes (no significant differences when compared to P1). Average time for P3 was 2.22±0.86 minutes, with significant differences compared with P1 3.87±1.53minutesvsP3 2.22±0.86 minutes, p<0.01 and P2 3.32±1.09minutesvsP3 2.22±0.86minutes, p<0.05. On the first day there was a very low percentage of errors (25%). At the end of the course, there was only one registered case (5%).

Conclusion:
Although attendants presented laparoscopic suturing experience, there was a significant improvement in their skills average time at the end of the training course. This is evident in the significant increase in performance quality of intracorporeal sutures on live tissue compared to the same task carried out on simulator. We conclude that, although many surgeons have considerable laparoscopic suturing expertise, there is still room for improvement to complete the intracorporeal suturing learning curve.