In reference to last weeks post, Worldwide Flu Pandemic?, the story has developed, with the BBC posting an article on the 20th of January saying "scientists who created a potentially more deadly bird flu strain have temporarily stopped their research amid fears it could be used by terrorists" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-16662346), full story on that URL.
In 2001, news arrived that the "first medical robot designed to operate on the brain has begun clinical trials at Queen's Medical Centre in Nottingham, UK" (http://tinyurl.com/6vcogut). This sounds quite astounding if you think about the level of accuracy and precision that surgeons need to have and; in terms of ethics, surely we couldn't give over the job of neurosurgery to a robot? This video shows neurosurgery that was carried out with an awake patient and underlines the accuracy that a neurosurgeon needs (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD8ckoy9NVU). They are able to do it while the patient is awake because there are no pain receptors in the brain and there can be "anaesthetic administered locally, to the scalp" (http://tinyurl.com/7dbrwec).
The robot that began its trials in 2001, called the "PathFinder, will not be able to do operations that are not already possible, but it could do them much faster and more accurately" (http://tinyurl.com/6vcogut). PathFinder can "align the surgical tools to within 1mm" (http://tinyurl.com/6wrqgnz) which is incredible and is certainly more accurate than conventional surgery, because of the movement of the surgeons hand with the instruments.
The PathFinder is also very safe, otherwise it would not pass the trials or even be used; as this New Scientist article illustrates, "despite the name, surgical robots are not automatic and do not operate in any way like factory assembly-line robots. Rather, they are precision machines controlled remotely by a surgeon" (http://tinyurl.com/6nfeb4b). Another article, http://www.imperial.ac.uk/college.asp?P=7449, shows an experiment that was carried out based on the precision of knee surgery by a robot called 'Acrobot' and also illustrates the precision of these robots.
Another example of a robot used for neurosurgery is the 'NeuroArm'. The team on the NeuroArm Project had to overcome a number of challenges, including "how could a machine be created to be as precise and dexterous as the human hand, without compromising surgical technique?" (http://www.neuroarm.org/project/). This is one of the questions that all of the companies who make robots for surgery must ask themselves. Another video (http://tinyurl.com/7383jft) shows the NeuroArm in action.
Ten years on from when PathFinder was first unveiled I have been unable to find any statistics on the performance of the robot at all or in fact many other articles on the robot. But there are other surgical robots that have been developed (worth looking at) since 2001, such as the NeuroArm (http://www.neuroarm.org/project/) and also the ROBOCAST (http://tinyurl.com/7pk33h9).
In 2001, news arrived that the "first medical robot designed to operate on the brain has begun clinical trials at Queen's Medical Centre in Nottingham, UK" (http://tinyurl.com/6vcogut). This sounds quite astounding if you think about the level of accuracy and precision that surgeons need to have and; in terms of ethics, surely we couldn't give over the job of neurosurgery to a robot? This video shows neurosurgery that was carried out with an awake patient and underlines the accuracy that a neurosurgeon needs (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD8ckoy9NVU). They are able to do it while the patient is awake because there are no pain receptors in the brain and there can be "anaesthetic administered locally, to the scalp" (http://tinyurl.com/7dbrwec).
The robot that began its trials in 2001, called the "PathFinder, will not be able to do operations that are not already possible, but it could do them much faster and more accurately" (http://tinyurl.com/6vcogut). PathFinder can "align the surgical tools to within 1mm" (http://tinyurl.com/6wrqgnz) which is incredible and is certainly more accurate than conventional surgery, because of the movement of the surgeons hand with the instruments.
The PathFinder is also very safe, otherwise it would not pass the trials or even be used; as this New Scientist article illustrates, "despite the name, surgical robots are not automatic and do not operate in any way like factory assembly-line robots. Rather, they are precision machines controlled remotely by a surgeon" (http://tinyurl.com/6nfeb4b). Another article, http://www.imperial.ac.uk/college.asp?P=7449, shows an experiment that was carried out based on the precision of knee surgery by a robot called 'Acrobot' and also illustrates the precision of these robots.
Another example of a robot used for neurosurgery is the 'NeuroArm'. The team on the NeuroArm Project had to overcome a number of challenges, including "how could a machine be created to be as precise and dexterous as the human hand, without compromising surgical technique?" (http://www.neuroarm.org/project/). This is one of the questions that all of the companies who make robots for surgery must ask themselves. Another video (http://tinyurl.com/7383jft) shows the NeuroArm in action.
Ten years on from when PathFinder was first unveiled I have been unable to find any statistics on the performance of the robot at all or in fact many other articles on the robot. But there are other surgical robots that have been developed (worth looking at) since 2001, such as the NeuroArm (http://www.neuroarm.org/project/) and also the ROBOCAST (http://tinyurl.com/7pk33h9).
The following publication summarizes the work on the Pathfinder robot before the funding was cut:
ReplyDeleteG Deacon, A Harwood, J Holdback, D Maiwand, M Pearce, I Reid, M Street, and J Taylor
Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part H: Journal of Engineering in Medicine, May 1, 2010; vol. 224, 5: pp. 691-713.
Had the project not been terminated the system's speed and accuracy would have opened up the possibility of new procedures not currently feasible.
Thank You very much. May I ask what the reasons for the termination of the project were? Was it down to cost? and do you think that the robot had the potential to do more complicated procedures?
ReplyDelete