Automated Feedback Selection for Robot-Assisted Training

Robot Assisted Force Feedback Surgery

Minimally invasive surgery characterizes a sophisticated operation technique in which long instruments are inserted into the patient through small incisions. Though providing crucial benefits compared to open surgery (i.e. reduced tissue traumatization) it is also faced with a number of disadvantages. One of the major problems is that the surgeon cannot access the operating field directly and, ...

Tactile Feedback for Robot Assisted Minimally Invasive Surgery: an Overview

Methods for haptic feedback in teleoperated robot-assisted surgery

Teleoperated minimally invasive surgical robots can significantly enhance a surgeon's accuracy, dexterity and visualization. However, current commercially available systems do not include significant haptic (force and tactile) feedback to the operator. This paper describes experiments to characterize this problem, as well as several methods to provide haptic feedback in order to improve surgeon...

Automated Tissue Retraction for Robot-Assisted Surgical Procedures

Robotic surgical assistants (RSAs) are enhancing physician performance, enabling them to perform more delicate and precise minimally invasive surgery (MIS). However, these devices are currently tele-operated and lack autonomy. In this paper, we focus on automating a relatively simple but commonly performed surgical task of tissue retraction, which involves grasping and lifting a thin layer of t...

Robot-Assisted Proprioceptive Training with Added Vibro-Tactile Feedback Enhances Somatosensory and Motor Performance

This study examined the trainability of the proprioceptive sense and explored the relationship between proprioception and motor learning. With vision blocked, human learners had to perform goal-directed wrist movements relying solely on proprioceptive/haptic cues to reach several haptically specified targets. One group received additional somatosensory movement error feedback in form of vibro-t...