NEW DELHI, Dec. 6 (Xinhua) -- In what is being claimed as the first of its kind surgery in the world, a doctor in India's western city of Ahmedabad has placed a balloon inside a woman's artery while sitting more than 30 km away from the patient, according to local media.
Called "in-human telerobotic coronary intervention", the robotic surgery was successfully performed by Dr. Tejas Patel on Wednesday, who is learned to have already done over 300 robotic surgeries. It took two years for Dr. Patel for preparation for the live operation.
The angioplasty procedure on a middle-aged woman was carried out by an internet-enabled robotic arm at a lab in the operation theater, which the doctor operated remotely. Meanwhile, a team of doctors and paramedics attended to the patient in the operation theater to take care of any eventualities.
English daily The Times of India quoted Dr. Patel as saying that telerobotics is a mix of telemedicine and robotics and has the potential to drastically change the way that health care is delivered to patients in remote areas.
The doctor said that similar surgeries could be performed using artificial intelligence from any distance across the globe.
"This has the power to transform coronary interventions in practice and beyond," he further stated after performing the surgery.
