A demonstration during the 49th Arab Health Expo in Dubai, saw the MicroPort ® Toumai® robot complete an ultra-remote 5G laparoscopic surgery across a distance of 7,000 kilometres from Dubai to Shanghai.
The procedure was enacted from the Toumai™ patient’s cart at the Dubai booth, through the surgeon console in Shanghai, with the system successfully performing “precise and smooth surgical actions such as dissection, traction, clamping, cutting, and suturing”.
On connectivity, the surgery was performed using only a 5G SIM card, with no signal lag or delay being reported, and the communication between the two locations being described as “smooth and well-coordinated”.
From the company’s website, a recent update states that “the Toumai® Laparoscopic Surgical Robot (Toumai®) has achieved 100 cases of 5G tele-surgeries “with a success rate of 100 percent”, through cooperation with more than 10 Chinese hospitals and covering specialties such as general surgery, urology, and thoracic surgery.
In other news on robotic systems, medical device company EndoQuest Robotics from Houston, Texas, has announced the successful closure of a $42 million C-1 preferred financing round, with the strategic funding set to help advance its flexible endoluminal robot which is designed to support minimally invasive procedures.
