Michelle DaCruz
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Apr 05/02) - Imagine you're on an operating table, while a three-armed robot presses a scalpel into your exposed flesh - oh, and the robot is being controlled by a surgeon 4,800 kilometres away.

Sound like the plot of an Arthur C. Clarke book? It's not.

It's called tele-robotic surgery and Yellowknife is hosting the first trial project in Canada, with the federal government picking up the $1 million price tag.

The Centre for Minimal Access Surgery at St. Joseph's Healthcare in Hamilton and surgeons at Stanton Regional Hospital are embarking on a joint research project of tele-monitoring, tele-robotic surgery, named Surgical Services Network.

This initiative could provide patients with access to world-renowned specialists without even leaving their home towns, while also giving Northern surgeons mentorship and peer guidance.

"We chose the Northwest Territories for the robotics trial purely because if we can successfully carry out a tele-robotic link between CMAS and Yellowknife, we can do it anywhere," said Dr. Mehran Anvari, director of the Centre for Minimal Access Surgery.

The head of medical services for Stanton, Dr. John Morse, said the project could eliminate feelings of isolation that are common among many rural doctors.

"Surgeons who want to stay and practice their chosen profession in our area will be able to have the support they need to stay current with the latest procedure without leaving the North," said Morse.

Anvari also highlighted the importance of doctors sharpening their skills while staying available to patients.

"Surgeons want to perform the procedure for which they have been trained. If they can do it in Yellowknife, they are likely to stay in Yellowknife," said Anvari.

The main challenge to using this technology in the North is eliminating the delay in transmission between Ontario and the NWT, according to Morse.

"You can't do surgery with a delay. The visuals and the mechanics must line up. We are confident that by increasing our bandwidth we can solve any potential problems," said Morse.

The project was sparked by a relationship between two of Stanton's surgeons and Anvari.

Morse also pointed out that many of the surgical procedures to be performed during the project are already available to patients in Yellowknife.

The actual robotic part of the surgery would only be one part of the total procedure, and the rest of the time the expert would observe and give feed-back only.

Although Morse could not specify what type of surgery will be performed first, he said it would likely involve repairing a hiatal hernia - a severe and chronic case of acid reflux.

Tele-surgery would be ideal in this instance since Dr. Anvari is a world-renowned expert in this field, said Morse.

The project begins in May, when Anvari will meet with the Stanton team.

While it is too soon for Morse to predict when exactly the first surgery will take place it will happen by the the project's completion in December.

If the pilot is successful, robotic surgery will continue in Yellowknife and expand to additional tele-monitoring sites in North Bay, Ontario, and Chicoutimi, Quebec.

Once these sites are functional the network will expand into other rural communities across the country.

The Robotic surgery has been performed in Canada since the 1980s, but this project is the first time tele-robotics is being used.

Tele-mentoring involves two-way video communication between an experienced surgeon and a remote surgeon.

Tele-robotics uses virtual reality technology to replicate the movements of a human hand in a remote robot.

The robot that will perform the surgery in Yellowknife will be a three-armed prototype, with a camera on one appendage and two arms free to perform the procedure.