The SATA-Drive: A Modular Robotic Drive for Reusable Steerable Laparoscopic Instruments

Introduction: Most robotic instruments and their drives still risk residual contamination due to cleaning complexities, rendering them limited reusable, and tend to have larger instruments than the 5mm laparoscopic standard. The novel steerable laparoscopic SATA-LRS uses modularity for cleanability and exchangeability. The SATA-Drive: a...

EASIER: A new model for online learning of minimally invasive surgery skills

Introduction: Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) can provide the tools to safely master minimally invasive surgery (MIS) skills in patient-free environments and receive immediate objective feedback without the constant presence of an instructor. However, TEL-based systems tend to work isolated from one another, focus on different skills, and...

Evaluation of an improved suspension system concept for surgical luminaires

Surgeons have indicated ergonomic problems with the surgical luminaire, which have been observed to occur during repositioning. The possibility of singularity, within the movement space of the translational subsystem of the current double-arm suspension systems, is confirmed to be the cause of these problems. In this study, a redesign of the...

Barriers to availability of surgical equipment in Kenya

Background & Objective: The need for surgery is currently not met in Sub-Saharan Africa, requiring both extra workforce and surgical equipment. Currently, there is a gap in the availability of surgical equipment which, among others, limits the provision of safe surgery. To design strategies to increase availability, the use of surgical...

Equipment for essential surgical care in 9 countries across Africa: availability, barriers and need for novel design

Shortages of medical equipment in low-and-middle income countries (LMICs) have been found by several previous studies that assessed surgical capacity. To increase surgical capacity, there is a need to identify the availability of specific types of surgical equipment on a local, regional and national level. A survey was conducted among surgeons...

Roadmap for design of surgical equipment for safe surgery worldwide

Safe and affordable surgery is not accessible for five billion people when they need it. Multiple surgical capacity studies have shown that hospitals in low-And-middle income countries do not have complete coverage of basic surgical equipment such as, theatre lights, anesthesia machines and electro surgical units. Currently, almost all...