Formulation of an IEEE RAS Standards Study Group on Surgical Robotics

Society authorized the lauch of an Information Session for the Formation of an IEEE RAS Standards Study Group on Surgical Robotics.
Proposed schedule: Tuesday, May 7th 8:00 am - 12, along the IEEE ICRA conference in Karlsruhe. 
Organizers: Venkat Krovi, Associate Professor, SUNY Buffalo and Gian-Luca Mariottini, Assistant Professor, UT Arlington .
Text of the call:
"The enormous growth of robotic surgical systems (and more generally computer-assisted surgical systems technology) in the past decade builds off from the significant practical utility, enormous economic value, and diversity of applications.  Surgical robotics has also greatly benefitted from the triple convergence of computing, communication and miniaturization. Other growth has come from the synergistic merger of novel component hardware technologies, innovative computational/algorithmic advances, and the system-level integration of diverse technological options. At the same time, several challenges arise not only from the complexities engendered within the human body but the diverse sets of multi-disciplinary knowledge that need to be merged to create these system-level solutions.
Despite the engendered challenges, several surgical robotic systems (and procedures) have now gone beyond the research-lab stage, to receiving  regulatory agency (FDA) approval, and are now routinely used in clinical applications (ranging from minimally-invasive general surgery, pediatric surgery, gynecology, urology, cardiothoracic surgery and otolaryngology). Various professional-societies (including surgical societies such as SAGES and MIRA) are beginning to grapple with a range of issues: 
  • appropriateness of  technologies; 
  • emergent clinical applications; 
  • training and accreditation; 
  • economics and viability; 
  • safety and risk-assessment; 
  • many others in this rapidly growing arena.
In this context, we believe that this is an appropriate time for the robotics and automation community as a whole to initiate a discussion of topics/sub-topics that may be ripe for standardization (based on level-of-interest and experiences of the community). Hence we would like to propose an information-gathering meeting at this ICRA’13 (on Tuesday May 7th, 8am -12pm) to solicit the participation and gauge the level of interest of the community-at-large towards the formation of an IEEE RAS Standards Study Group in the arena of Surgical Robotics. 
The proposed mandate of this Study Group would be to:
  1. initiate a dialogue between the scientific, engineering and medical professionals;
  2. bring together experts from academia and industry to form expert-groups;
  3. leverage this expertise in developing metrics and standards framework
  4. identify the most prominent areas needing standardization in surgical robotics;
  5. identify standards and validation benchmarks to promote the transition of research-lab technologies to the operating room.
A white paper will be developed based on the discussion at this information meeting - so please come and share your thoughts, suggestions and opinions with us. Attendance is free and refreshments
will be provided."
For more information:
Website: https://sites.google.com/site/ieeerassurgrobstandards/
Mailing-list: ieee-ras-surgrob-standards@googlegroups.com

Comments

Popular Posts