The director of robotic surgery at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI), Kurshid A Guru and Thenkurussi Kesavadas, Professor at the University at Buffalo (UB) and Director of the Virtual Reality lab have created comprehensive training modules to help new surgeons to conduct robot-aided surgeries.
The purpose of the modules is to train new surgeons to become experts in handling these complicated operations guaranteeing safety of the patients and resulting in positive outcomes.
RoSS with Inventors
The designed training module is called Hands-on Surgical Training (HoST) created to enable users to effectively utilize their invention, the Robotic Surgical Simulator or RoSS. These process-specific software programs are provided for four frequently performed least invasive robot-aided processes such as hysterectomy i.e. uterus removal, prostatectomy i.e. prostrate gland removal, cystectomy i.e. removal of the bladder and extended lymph node analysis.
The four HoST modules were displayed first at the annual American Urological Association Conference that was held from May 14th to May 17th in Washington, DC. A unique feature of the HoST modules is that the programs are interactive and meticulously records as well as simulates the exact hand movements of the world’s most famous surgeons while conducting least invasive surgeries.
Dr Guru stated that it is truly exciting to be able to perform a real surgical procedure with the use of the simulator along with the expert surgeon but not on the patient. This truly marks a break- through in the field of surgical training, which would help the new surgeon to master the techniques involved in robot-aided surgeries as well as help experienced surgeons to sharpen their surgical skills. David Parish, CEO of Simulated Surgical Systems (SSS) stated that both the RoSS and the HoST modules are good examples of how training surgeons can learn the expert skills that robotic surgeons have.