Affordable Mobile-based Simulator for Robotic Surgery

TL;DR

This paper introduces an affordable mobile simulator for robotic surgery training, aiming to reduce costs and increase accessibility for developing essential surgical skills.

Contribution

It presents a novel mobile dexterity training kit with a portable design and a simulated environment for practicing robotic surgical gestures.

Findings

Demonstrated usability of the system for surgical skill development

Showed potential for cost-effective training in robotic surgery

Validated the system's effectiveness through preliminary study

Abstract

Robotic surgery and novel surgical instrumentation present great potentials towards safer, more accurate and consistent minimally invasive surgery. However, their adoption is dependent to the access to training facilities and extensive surgical training. Robotic instruments require different dexterity skills compared to open or laparoscopic. Surgeons, therefore, are required to invest significant time by attending extensive training programs. Contrary, hands on experiences represent an additional operational cost for hospitals as the availability of robotic systems for training purposes is limited. All these technological and financial barriers for surgeons and hospitals hinder the adoption of robotic surgery. In this paper, we present a mobile dexterity training kit to develop basic surgical techniques within an affordable setting. The system could be used to train basic surgical gestures and to develop the motor skills needed for manoeuvring robotic instruments. Our work presents the architecture and components needed to create a simulated environment for training sub-tasks as well as a design for portable mobile manipulators that can be used as master controllers of different instruments. A preliminary study results demonstrate usability and skills development with this system.