The effect of a robot-assisted surgical system on the kinematics of user movements

Teleoperated robot-assisted surgery (RAS) offers many advantages over traditional minimally invasive surgery. However, RAS has not yet realized its full potential, and it is not clear how to optimally train surgeons to use these systems. We hypothesize that the dynamics of the master manipulator impact the ability of users to make desired movements with the robot. We compared freehand and teleoperated movements of novices and experienced surgeons. To isolate the effects of dynamics from procedural knowledge, we chose simple movements rather than surgical tasks. We found statistically significant effects of teleoperation and user expertise in several aspects of motion, including target acquisition error, movement speed, and movement smoothness. Such quantitative assessment of human motor performance in RAS can impact the design of surgical robots, their control, and surgeon training methods, and eventually, improve patient outcomes.