Once again, we are going to introduce you to another reason that demonstrates that technology is an excellent ally of medicine. The robot developed by MIT engineers will be used in emergency surgery for patients who have suffered a stroke.
One of the great advantages is the possibility of performing the procedure remotely.
It is not a novelty: the surgeries already have technological assistance, through a robot that enhances the performance of the surgeons. In fact, there are already several educational institutions that work with this type of equipment, which has been improved over the years.
However, as mentioned by Engadget, these robots have not been developed to treat cardiovascular accidents, for example, so engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) decided to create a robotic system intended for emergency surgery.
The team presented a robotic arm, which doctors can remotely control using an adapted joystick. The objective is to enable the treatment of patients who have suffered a stroke and require surgical intervention.
According to what was published in the Science Robotics, the robot has a magnet that allows surgeons to adjust its orientation to guide it through arteries and vessels. In this way, and handled by a professional, the robot is able to remove blood clots in the patient's brain.
As is currently the case with only manual interventions, surgeons will have to be guided by live images in order to reach the clots. In addition, the robot will allow treating patients who are not physically with professionals.
The problem of the procedure, currently, is related to its complexity, taking several years to be mastered. This is because it involves running a wire through the patient's vessels and arteries and it is crucial to ensure that nothing is damaged. Surgeons trained for this type of intervention are usually allocated in larger hospitals and, therefore, patients who live in more remote locations take a long time to be helped. This delay, which involves transporting the patient, shortens the critical time window available for treatment after a stroke to save your life or preserve your brain function.
We imagined that instead of transporting a patient from a rural area to a big city, he could go to a local hospital where nurses could install this system. A neurosurgeon at a large medical center could look at live images of the patient and use the robot to operate. This is our future dream.
revealed Xuanhe Zhaoan MIT professor and member of the team that developed the robot.
Xuanhe Zhao, an MIT professor and member of the team that developed the robot
MIT engineers revealed that during testing, they needed just one hour to train neurosurgeons to use the technology. In the end, the professionals were able to successfully perform the procedure, removing the fake blood clots from a model that replicated, in full size, the brain.
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