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Surgical Robot Removes Calgary Woman's Brain Tumor

Posted by timothy on from the and-yes-it-had-permission-to-do-so dept.

Raver32 points out an article in the Victoria Times Colonist about an interesting advance in robotic surgery: "Calgary doctors have made surgical history, using a robot to remove a brain tumor from a 21-year-old woman. Doctors used remote controls and an imaging screen, similar to a video game, to guide the two-armed robot through Paige Nickason's brain during the nine-hour surgery Monday. Surgical instruments acting as the hands of the robot — called NeuroArm — provided surgeons with the tools needed to successfully remove the egg-shaped tumor."

3 of 107 comments (clear)

  1. More Info. by Overkill+Nbuta · · Score: 5, Informative

    You can find some more info on this at.
    http://www.ucalgary.ca/news/may2008/neuroArm
    I think it will be interesting if a doctor can have less fatigue and sit in a chair and do operations more quickly and more precisely with this.

    I understand that there are some operations where you would want the doctor to be on site to help with complications. But some of them like removing a brain tumor where its a procedure that you just need to cut something out it might be able to help the limited supply of doctors in the world be better utilized.

    1. Re:More Info. by LordVader717 · · Score: 3, Informative

      They've got a website for the Neuroarm complete with video clip and pics.

  2. It's Not a Robot by juancnuno · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is great and all, but I feel the term "robot" is overly misused. To me, robot implies a computerized autonomy. If the doctor controlled the thing, then to me that's no robot.