Robot-Assisted Fracture Surgery: Surgical Requirements and System Design

Georgilas, Ioannis; Dagnino, Giulio; Tarassoli, Payam; Atkins, Roger; Dogramadzi, Sanja

Abstract

© 2018, Biomedical Engineering Society. The design of medical devices is a complex and crucial process to ensure patient safety. It has been shown that improperly designed devices lead to errors and associated accidents and costs. A key element for a successful design is incorporating the views of the primary and secondary stakeholders early in the development process. They provide insights into current practice and point out specific issues with the current processes and equipment in use. This work presents how information from a user-study conducted in the early stages of the RAFS (Robot Assisted Fracture Surgery) project informed the subsequent development and testing of the system. The user needs were captured using qualitative methods and converted to operational, functional, and non-functional requirements based on the methods derived from product design and development. This work presents how the requirements inform a new workflow for intra-articular joint fracture reduction using a robotic system. It is also shown how the various elements of the system are developed to explicitly address one or more of the requirements identified, and how intermediate verification tests are conducted to ensure conformity. Finally, a validation test in the form of a cadaveric trial confirms the ability of the designed system to satisfy the aims set by the original research question and the needs of the users.

Citation

Georgilas, I., Dagnino, G., Tarassoli, P., Atkins, R., & Dogramadzi, S. (2018). Robot-Assisted Fracture Surgery: Surgical Requirements and System Design. Annals of Biomedical Engineering, 46(10), 1637-1649. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-018-2005-y

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 8, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Mar 9, 2018
• Publication Date: Oct 15, 2018
• Journal: Annals of Biomedical Engineering
• Print ISSN: 0090-6964
• Electronic ISSN: 1573-9686
• Publisher: Springer (part of Springer Nature)
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 46
• Issue: 10
• Pages: 1637-1649
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-018-2005-y
• Keywords: system design and development, computer-assisted surgery, medical robotics, percutaneous fracture surgery
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/857882
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10439-018-2005-y
• Additional Information: Additional Information : The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10439-018-2005-y