Dundee and US surgeons achieve world-first stroke surgery using robot

"Prof Iris Grunwald, of the University of Dundee, performed the remote thrombectomy - the removal of blood clots after a stroke - on a human cadaver that had been donated to medical science. The professor was at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee, while the body she was operating on while using the machine was across the city at the university. Hours later, Ricardo Hanel - a neurosurgeon in Florida - used the technology to carry out the first transatlantic surgery from his Jacksonville base on a human body in Dundee over 4,000 miles (6,400km) away."

"The team has called it a potential "game changer" if it becomes approved for use on patients. The medics believe this technology could transform stroke care, as a delay in accessing specialist treatment can have a direct impact on the chances of recovery. Prof Grunwald said: "It felt as if we were witnessing the first glimpse of the future. "Where previously this was thought to be science fiction, we demonstrated that every step of the procedure can already be done.""

"The University of Dundee is the global training centre of the World Federation for Interventional Stroke Treatment, and is the only place in the UK where doctors can operate on cadavers with human blood circulated in the vessels to mimic treatment on a live human. "This was the first time that we could perform the whole mechanical thrombectomy procedure in a real human body to show that all steps of the procedure are possible," said Prof Grunwald."

Doctors from Scotland and the US completed a first remote robotic thrombectomy on donated human cadavers, performing clot removal with operators physically distant from the body. Professor Iris Grunwald operated from Ninewells Hospital while the cadaver sat at the University of Dundee, then a neurosurgeon in Florida ran the first transatlantic robotic procedure from Jacksonville. The team described the technique as a potential game changer because rapid specialist access affects recovery chances. The University of Dundee uses circulated-blood cadaver models for realistic training and confirmed that every step of the mechanical thrombectomy can be performed remotely.

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