Long-distance surgery remote dream no more
Host of tech innovations catalysing rapid change throughout healthcare industry
Telesurgery, or using a robot to operate on a patient hundreds of kilometres away, could be the future of healthcare, say experts. At Microsoft’s annual Inspire conference in Washington DC this week, some of these technological advances in healthcare are being demonstrated to more than 17,000 attendees.
The technology behind longdistance operations and surgery began when organisations such as Nasa started working out how to treat people in a space craft.
The concept has evolved and according to Microsoft, telesurgery is now being used more widely.
The US Department of Defence is testing Trauma Pods, using robots to provide temporary medical care for soldiers on the battlefront before they can get to a doctor or medic.
Allowing more people to access world-leading healthcare and surgery without having to travel is just the start of the changes happening in the sector, according to Microsoft general manager of health Neil Jordan.
“Certain areas of the health industry are really starting to use things like augmented reality (AR) and some of the newest technology to improve the way they operate,” Jordan said.
“So HoloLens for example which is AR and means you can still see what’s going on around you when you’re using it, is being used in lots of interesting applications already — [like] teaching medical students.”
Jordan said Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in the US was one example.
The university uses HoloLens to help teach surgery and anatomy by creating a 3D image either on a cadaver, a dummy or in free space to give students a more in-depth view of complex body systems or surgical procedures.
“We’re also starting to see the use of HoloLens for things like assisted placements of stents so when you’re doing laparoscopic surgery you can . . . map that onto the human body as you go in, and get a much clearer idea of where the stent is in relation to the rest of the body,” Jordan said.
“It hasn’t gone through FDA approval yet but we’re seeing these kinds of examples a lot more.”
It’s not just in performing surgery that the HoloLens can be used, with companies such as medical equipment manufacturer Stryker Corporation using the AR devices to help plan operating rooms — a service it was demonstrating at Microsoft Inspire.
Potential customers could walk into an empty operating theatre or room, and place 3D versions of the equipment needed, then walk around the room moving the equipment to figure out the best composition.
“It’s an expensive thing to get wrong and being able to walk around and get a feel for how a room will work and where best to put things before locking it in, is a pretty amazing thing to be able to do,” said a Stryker spokesperson.
Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas is home to some of the sickest children in the world Jordan said — many of whom have congenital heart diseases.
Despite having some of the best surgeons in the world, the previous standard of care for children going home after surgery was to provide parents a ring binder, a pulse oximeter and a weight scale, and to have a weekly check-up with the hospital.
According to Jordan, this meant the hospital was not catching complications soon enough.
“So now they send them home with a Surface computer and an application called Champ which allows them to notate various things about the child’s progress on a daily basis and every day they take a video of the baby in the same place at the same time and it’s uploaded to the cloud,” Jordan said.
“AI is used across it to do basic understanding of whether this is normal or abnormal and they’re catching complications way earlier. The more people that go through it, the better the system gets at knowing what is normal or not and the better the outcomes we are seeing.”
Machine learning systems are also being used to verify healthcare invoices and reduce accidental or fraudulent billing requests — a system Jordan said was already saving the healthcare industry millions.
Holly Ryan travelled to Microsoft Inspire courtesy of Microsoft.