Since the first robot-assisted surgery 35 years ago, robotic minimally invasive surgery has made significant progress and improvements. Today’s surgical robots can perform abdominal surgery with a smaller incision, reducing postoperative complications and improving patient prognosis.
But equally important are innovations around real-time data collection for interactive feedback. Today’s surgical robots are equipped with dozens of miniature sensors that can measure the force, position, and movement of the robot arm in the patient’s body. Imagine the benefits of a single incision robot that has all-round motion and mimics the surgeon’s hands, wrists, elbows, and shoulders, facilitating unrestricted access to critical anatomical structures. In addition, these data will provide much-needed insight and analysis for the true and accurate cost of treating individual patients and populations.
Robot-assisted surgery, and the large-scale data generated from these miniature sensors, may be part of a solution that democratizes the quality of surgery and care and strengthens the sharing of knowledge among surgeons with different experience levels.
Access to surgical care: the imminent global crisis
The global gap between the demand for surgical procedures and the available surgical workforce continues to widen.this AAMC project By 2034, the world will face a shortage of 15,800 to 30,200 subspecialty (general surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics) surgeons.
At the same time, the world’s population is aging-the proportion of people over 65 Will increase From one-tenth in 2019 to one-sixth in 2050. The demand for a series of surgical procedures from hip replacement to cataract surgery to hernia repair will soar.
This projected surgical supply and demand challenge has two major implications. First, unless measures can be taken to expand the surgical workforce, the waiting time for elective surgery may be prolonged and the patient’s prognosis may deteriorate.A sort of 2016 Commonwealth Fund International Health Policy Survey Of 17 countries found that for elective surgery, the waiting time for knee replacement is about 140 days, and the waiting time for hip replacement is about 110 days. People waiting for a new hip or knee joint usually have a lower quality of life and sometimes require prescription medication or physical therapy to control their pain. Imagine the impact on health if these waiting times increase.
The second implication is the uneven distribution of experienced surgeons in different regions or communities. Many young and talented surgeons are attracted to work in large university hospitals concentrated in urban areas. They are attracted by the excitement and excitement of working in cutting-edge clinical and research environments. This has left more rural areas unserviced and reduced the supply of surgical talents, further limiting access to quality care.The sharpest is Shortage of general surgeons In rural areas, some rural hospitals cannot meet the needs of patients for more complex surgeries.
As the demand for knowledge sharing is so great, some surgeons are supplementing their training and preparation Watch the video on YouTube Demonstrate common operations such as laparoscopic cholecystectomy. But the quality and professionalism of some videos are doubtful.
How real-time data capture works
Let us imagine a surgeon performing robot-assisted abdominal hernia repair on a patient. The surgeon sits on the surgeon’s console in the operating room and can view the data in real time and understand how certain movements exerted by the robotic arm can cause unacceptable pressure and force on the surrounding tissues in the abdominal cavity.
Surgeons can not only use this data to make better decisions for patients in real time, but also make future robot-assisted surgery more accurate and reduce the chance of complications.
Imagine using this data on a large scale. Using artificial intelligence algorithms and data science, we can filter and process data to make the collective knowledge of minimally invasive abdominal hernia repair stronger in the surgical community. This will help provide information for better decision making and improve the accuracy of future surgeries. More widespread use of surgical robots and data collection can help make high-quality surgical care more equitable between rich and poor communities. Surgeons located in rural community hospitals can benefit from data-driven best practices for abdominal hernia repair, which are based on robotic-assisted surgery hundreds or thousands of miles away. But this can only be achieved through the advanced sensing provided by today’s surgical robots.
Improve the workload of surgeons
Democratization occurs when we use technology to make things that require specialized knowledge available to more people. Open source software is democratizing, which makes it easier for many people to innovate together. It happens in manufacturing using 3D printing and engineering using CAD. It can and should happen during surgery.
Surgical robots and the improvement of surgery based on data-driven knowledge sharing cannot solve our imminent shortage of surgeons by themselves. We also need to expand the surgical workforce while making the workload of each surgeon easier to manage.
As we continue to use data from successful operations, over time, surgical robots will help automate more parts of the surgical process—while improving the patient experience and reducing complications. More automation will free surgeons from performing routine and rote tasks that account for a large part of their workload, help reduce burnout, and make surgeons’ careers more ideal than they are now.
Our goal is not to allow robots to perform complex operations without human involvement. But the use of surgical robotics to democratize access to quality care in underserved communities—using data-based best practices—is what we can achieve and what the world needs.
