In a first, surgical robots learned tasks by watching videos – Robots have been trained to perform surgical tasks with the skill of human doctors, even learning to correct their own mistakes during surgeries.

From the article

>Now, a team of Johns Hopkins University and Stanford University researchers has reported a significant advance, training robots with videos to perform surgical tasks with the skill of human doctors.

>The robots learned to manipulate needles, tie knots and suture wounds on their own. Moreover, the trained robots went beyond mere imitation, correcting their own slip-ups without being told ― for example, picking up a dropped needle. Scientists have already begun the next stage of work: combining all of the different skills in full surgeries performed on animal cadavers.

>A new generation of more autonomous robots holds the potential to help address a serious shortage of surgeons in the United States, the researchers said.

>Presented at the recent Conference on Robot Learning in Munich, the research comes almost four decades after the PUMA 560 became the first robot to assist in the operating room, helping with a brain biopsy in 1985.

>The new work is currently undergoing review for publication in a journal. And the next-generation surgical robots will need to demonstrate safety and effectiveness in clinical trials, and receive approval from the Food and Drug Administration before they can become a fixture in hospitals.

You know, of all the professions I thought we’d be replacing with robots, I did not think that surgery would come before burger flippers.

Like I really thought we’d be ordering from flippyburgerbot before surgeonbot5000 was cutting things out of us.