Yes, we have read about a robot that can help combat malaria, with the potential for robots to provide a brighter future in the fight against the ebola virus, but here we are with a robot which is capable of performing brain surgery – through a very different means. This particular robot will go about its duty through the patient’s cheek, now how about that? Not just any brain surgery in general, but to make its way around corrective epilepsy brain surgery in particular, and doing so with a far lower risk than the normal method, not to mention in a less invasive manner.
For a percentage of epilepsy patients, medication is less effective at controlling seizures, or it doesn’t work at all. For these patients, there is another option: brain surgery. This is usually a deeply invasive procedure, wherein the section of the patient’s brain is either removed, stimulated or disconnected; afterward, recovery can take up to three months. A robot five years in the making by researchers at Vanderbilt University may be in line to make the surgery less time consuming, less invasive and with a shorter recovery time. The area of the brain involved in epileptic seizures is the hippocampus, which is located in the lower regions of the brain. The surgical robot developed by mechanical engineering graduate student David Comber and mechanical engineering associate professor Eric Barth enters the brain from underneath by going through the patient’s cheek, carefully negotiating gaps in the bone. This is not only a shorter route, it also avoids drilling through the skull.