Robot Surgeon promise to save lives!

The University of Washington BioRobotics Lab has been working on developing a remote controlled two armed surgical robot to operate on people. The idea for the robot would be to assist in saving lives in remote communities, war zones and disaster areas. A group of surgeons, aerospace engineers and networking experts have been developing the prototype which could eventually become an integrating part of the equipment soldiers would carry around in their armoured vehicle or would be deployed in remote area to help save injured people.

Studies done by the American Military have shown that nearly two third of combat casualties comes within 30 minutes. There is precious little time to perform even simple life saving procedures, such as controlling bleeding.

The medical vehicle that would be equipped with this technology would have the military doctor stationed safely away from the front line perform the operation. This could be done in most time a lot faster than evacuating the injured person to the nearest hospital. Even though it still is in the prototype and research phase, the robotic surgeons would prove to be a life saving device for many. Huge advancement in the robotic and wireless field over the past few years have allowed engineers to make great leap in the development of such technology.

The International Federation of Robotics estimates the number of robots used in surgery and therapy at 2800 units worldwide. These units include the da Vinci surgical system, currently the only commercially available surgical robot approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

A transatlantic experiment was performed with a surgeon in London using a regular Internet connection with iChat and Skype to control a set of robotic arms to perform movement in an attempt to sew up a dummy patient. This was done with free technology available today; new hardware/software development will allow for even better results, but this is a good indication of what is to come in a not too distant future. With the use of unmanned, mobile robotic technology, the U.S. Department of Defence expects to reduce deployed personnel by up to 30% by 2025. And just when we thought we had seen it all.