Ingestible Medical Robots Could Remove Batteries From Stomachs (washingtonpost.com)

"A child swallows a battery every 3 hours," reports a new article in the Washington Post. But now, gurps_npc writes: MIT has developed a small ingestible robot to remove watch batteries that kids swallow. It starts out folded up tight and surrounded by an ice sheath. You swallow it, the ice melts, and it unfolds. Then a doctor uses magnets to direct it to the battery, it wraps itself around the battery, preventing it from leaking acid until you pass it — perhaps a bit faster with the doctor using the magnets to guide it down through your system.
Interestingly, the MIT researchers built their proof-of-concept robot using a durable pork casing -- "the same stuff you might find surrounding a hot dog or kielbasa."

Comments

Someone stop that child from eating batteries

[Rubinhood]

Problem solved.

How fast is this?

[PPH]

Steering little pouches around with external magnets while irradiating some poor kid with X-rays (so you can steer the 'robot') sounds time consuming. How does this compare (both in time and cost) with using a GI endoscope? Or just shoving a funnel and some syrup of ipecac down the kid's throat and having him vomit the battery back up?

This sounds like an interesting but very special purpose procedure and equipment. Better care might be had using commonly available tools.