98 | Marek’s Take: Bringing 5G to the operating table | ----------- | |
FierceWireless: Wireless | 2019-09-21 08:00 | ????0? | |
Demonstrations of 5G remote surgery are already starting to happen. The Times of India reported that in June a surgeon in China performed a gall bladder surgery, called a laparoscopic cholecystectomy, from about 125 miles away using a 5G connection. The surgery was conducted in the remote area of the Shennongjia forestry district branch and was transmitted via live feed to experts in the Taihe Hospital in the city of Shiyan. China Mobile provided the 5G link.Here in the U.S., consultant Chetan Sharma earlier this month demonstrated how a 5G remote surgery might work during his Mobile Future Forward conference. In this case, Sharma used a wired connection to simulate a 5G link. It was a dedicated link so there was no delay. Sharma wore a virtual reality headset connected to an operating room in Seattle. Using the VR headset and controllers he was able to plant a virtual screw in a patient’s spine at the correct angle. Meanwhile, in the Seattle operating room a doctor who also wore a VR headset was able to see what Sharma was doing and use a physical screw and place it in the spine on the operating table.And while he admits this may seem like a radical concept today, he believes that enough progress will be made so that doing remote surgery over a 5G connection will become a reality. “There are numerous breakthroughs in AI [artificial intelligence] and ML [machine learning], simulated 5G, computer vision, edge computing, advanced camera systems, VR and other technologies that are coming together in a seamless way to change how surgeries are done in the future,” Sharma said.And Sharma isn`t the only one who thinks 5G remote surgery will be a reality one day. Chris Penrose, president of advanced mobility and enterprise solutions at AT&T, said that as 5G networks mature, remote surgery will become more viable. He added that capabilities such as network slicing and lower latency will provide the network reliability that is necessary to make remote surgery a reality.But is there a business model to support this scenario? Sharma said that 5G remote surgery makes financial sense for certain types of surgeries where there may only be a few experienced surgeons in the world. Those surgeons can only handle so many surgeries a year because they are limited by location and availability. If some of their surgeries could be done remotely, they could do more. -- ???????? | |||
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