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Robotic Telesurgery by Remote Surgeons

Posted by Zonk on Fri May 19, 2006 07:37 PM
from the does-it-hurt-when-i-do-*this* dept.
Roland Piquepaille writes "In a few years, telesurgery performed by multi-armed robots remotely controlled by real surgeons located hundreds or thousands of kilometers away will become commonplace. Today, Canadian doctors from the Centre for Minimal Access Surgery (CMAS) are developing the technology for NASA. Their goal is to build a portable robotic unit that would be used in space missions, war zones and remote areas within five years. So far, the experiments already done in Canada and for NASA are extremely encouraging. But read more for additional details and pictures of a real surgeon controlling such a robot."

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  • Problems? (Score:3, Funny)

    by mr-mafoo (891779) on Friday May 19 2006, @07:41PM (#15369721)

    "Oh no! The connection's lagging doctor!"

    "Reconfigure the upstream bandwidth, and re-route all traffic to the backup server!"

  • X-Bender (Score:2)

    X-Bender: Fry: Stop being such a baby and chop my hands off!
  • by Ungrounded Lightning (62228) on Friday May 19 2006, @07:48PM (#15369752) Journal
    ... QoS hooks are in and solid.

    This is a very strong argument for tiered bandwidth - so ISPs can guarantee that surgical waldo packets take priority over, say, downloads of the latest release of an OS or a new movie.

    It's one thing to hiccup when you're handling a VoIP packet. It's quite another when you're handling the content of a feedback loop including a video camera, a surgeon, a scalpel, and a vital organ.
    • Well, since the unit is being developed to perform surgery in space, as well, I imagine they'll be using dedicated video/data links. There's no real mention of what exactly they will be using, but I'd bet that "advanced telecommunications technology" does
      • The space application doesn't guarantee immunity from a big time lag--just the opposite. If NASA wants to use this for missions to the Moon or Mars, there will be a lag, and it will be quite noticible irregardless of how much they pay for their bandwidth.
        • The system would be totally impractical for earth-bound surgeons to use for Mars trips. Even the moon, with a second and half lag one way, would introduce some bad problems.

          But it seems obvious to me, at least, that this would only be usable with
      • There's no real mention of what exactly they will be using, but I'd bet that "advanced telecommunications technology" doesn't mean internet.

        A QoS-enabled Internet would work just fine. And it's coming - unless misguided "Net Neutrality" laws throw the bab
      • Isn't that What T1, OC3, etc. are for?

        Only if they're a TDM point-to-point or switched connection, or a virtual one using something like ATM. In which case it's not the Internet.

        It's connection-oriented, not packet-oriented (even if it's packets being car
  • Awesome. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by RoffleTheWaffle (916980) on Friday May 19 2006, @07:49PM (#15369757) Journal
    Now we can outsource the medical field to India, too. *rimshot*
  • CounterStrike Surgeons (Score:5, Funny)

    by The MAZZTer (911996) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .tzzagem.> on Friday May 19 2006, @07:57PM (#15369797) Homepage
    Probably already been stated, but I can see it now...

    Doctor [Scalpel] Patient
    Doctor: WTF LAG
  • Trouble (Score:4, Funny)

    by tocs (866673) on Friday May 19 2006, @08:03PM (#15369826)
    Oh no, I thought the scalpel was moving away from the patient!!!
  • As a med student and sysadmin I just wondered over a couple of potentially isues

    What the maximum allowed network latency and thereby the maximum allowed operation distance be? Could somebody come with an answer?
    will it do for spacetravel?
    I mean they had to make the marsrovers autonomously, due to transmitting time.

    They say they will take it to the battlefield. Come on it is monstreus piece of equipment, with a weight of approx a ton. For what reason wil they take it to the battlefield.
    Not enough surgeons available at the frontline military service?
    They will still need staff at operation ward, nurses anesthesiologist and so on.

    We have a few of these robots at the university hospitals. Normally we have a group of surgens stading by just in case things goes wrong. We do not trust the machine totally.

    I really do hope they are hackerproff. What and opportunity to blackmail people.
    "Pay me or your husbend will end up without his left kneecap. Your VISA number please"

    Regards Rune
  • Personally.. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Kelz (611260) on Friday May 19 2006, @08:39PM (#15369985)
    I'm paying my doctor too much already to allow HIM to telecommute.
  • Advantages and disadvantages... (Score:3, Informative)

    by kcbrown (7426) <slashdot@sysexperts.com> on Friday May 19 2006, @08:39PM (#15369992)
    Advantages: robotics can be extremely precise. If programmed properly, it can compensate for any twitchiness on the part of the operator.

    But the disadvantages are significant: the feel isn't the same as performing the surgery for real. Now, for certain types of surgery that problem isn't a problem, but the human hand is actually quite sensitive to pressures and other types of feedback that I'm sure are quite invaluable to a surgeon (IANAS, however). A machine can provide some of that feedback through the link but the amount of feedback will be limited by the sensory capability of the machine.

    So, like many things, I can see this being useful for a relatively limited set of surgical operations, while for others "being there" will remain necessary.

    That said, if I have to choose between having this and having nothing at all (a battlefield comes to mind for such a situation), I'd rather have this and I'll take my chances with the limitations...

  • da vinci system (Score:3, Informative)

    by VoidEngineer (633446) on Friday May 19 2006, @09:23PM (#15370151) Homepage
    For more information on telerobotic surgery systems (they're a few years old now):

    http://www.teleroboticsurgeons.com/ [teleroboticsurgeons.com]
    http://www.teleroboticsurgeons.com/davinci.htm [teleroboticsurgeons.com]
    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd= Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=1471286 6 [nih.gov]

  • by shoolz (752000) on Friday May 19 2006, @10:21PM (#15370347) Homepage
    Wouldn't simply Robotic Telesurgery be an appropriate title? Wouldn't simply Robotic Telesurgery be an appropriate title?
  • h@ck3d (Score:3, Funny)

    by Tablizer (95088) on Saturday May 20 2006, @12:56AM (#15370736) Homepage Journal
    All your spleen are belong to us
    • (except perhaps at wildly inflated prices)

      What makes you think that this is going to be cheap?? The only robotic surgery on the market (Da Vinci) is so expensive that people question whether it actually saves people any money even though recovery time is
    • by WidescreenFreak (830043) on Friday May 19 2006, @08:54PM (#15370042) Homepage Journal
      You're forgetting the lawyers, though. Can you imagine what malpractice lawyers are going to think? Imagine them trying to sue a doctor who botched a remote surgery in a country with no kind of extradition treaty! I think that the trial lawyers of America would fight this more than the doctors if the goal is to "internationalize" medicine. Allowing remote surgeries will completely screw up many lawyer's ability to go for those higly lucrative malpractice lawsuits if the doctor is outside of the country's borders. But I'll bet that they would fight like crazy to allow it to be used domestically where the doctor and patient are both in the same country because of the ease of filing a lawsuit.

      Personally, with the exception of minor, routine surgery, there is no frickin' way I'd want anyone but a real doctor and real nurses right there with me. Even the slightest possibility of a network dropout while the scalpel is cutting is terrifying to say the least. I don't care how much redundancy there is between me and the remote doctor. There is no way to 100% guarantee a solid connection at any given time, although I'm sure that a number of /.ers would like to try to convince me otherwise. At least with a doctor right there I can hear him say, "Oops!" instead of trusting some doctor who can mute his microphone from a thousand miles away -- and, damn it, they better guarantee <1 ms response time! :)

      Honestly, I think that you asked the right question, but you asked it the wrong way.
      [ Parent ]
      • At least with a doctor right there I can hear him say, "Oops!" instead of trusting some doctor who can mute his microphone from a thousand miles away -- and, damn it, they better guarantee I don't know if I were to wake up and hear the doctor say opps dur