Autonomous Laproscopic Surgery
mhajicek writes:
Surgical robot performs world-first autonomous laparoscopic procedure:
Known as the Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot (STAR), the robotic-arm-equipped device was designed by researchers at Johns Hopkins University.
[...] In the more recent experiments, an improved and more autonomous version of STAR successfully performed the procedure laparoscopically - this means that only small incisions were required for the entry and exit of the surgical tools. What's more, the robot did so four times (on four pigs), producing "significantly better results than humans performing the same procedure."
Intestinal anastomosis is said to be a particularly tricky operation, as it requires multiple sutures to be made in soft tissue with a consistently high rate of precision. If any of the sutures are misplaced, intestinal leakage may occur, which can have very serious consequences for the patient.
Among the new features on this version of STAR are specialized suturing tools, better imaging systems (which include a 3D endoscope) and perhaps most notably, an autonomous control system. The latter adapts the surgical plan in real time, based on the often unpredictable movements of the soft intestinal tissue.
Journal Reference:
H. Saeidi, J. D. Opfermann, M. Kam, et al. Autonomous robotic laparoscopic surgery for intestinal anastomosis, Science Robotics (DOI: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/scirobotics.abj2908)
Read more of this story at SoylentNews.