Pilot study of design method for surgical robot using workspace reproduction system.

Recent development methods for surgical robots have an inherent problem. The user-friendliness of operating robot cannot be revealed until completion of the robot. To assist the design of a surgical robot that is user-friendly in terms of surgeon's operation, we propose a system that considers the operation manner of surgeon during the design phase of the robot. This system includes the following functionality: 1) a master manipulator that measures the operation manner of the surgeon (operator), and 2) a slave simulator in which the mechanical parameters can be configured freely. The operator can use the master manipulator to operate the slave simulator. Using this system, we investigate the necessity of considering the operator's manner when developing a surgical robot. In the experiment, we used three instruments with mechanisms that differed with respect to the length between bending joints and measured the trajectory of each instrument tip position during the surgical task. The results show that there are differences in the trajectories of each mechanism. Based on the results, changes in the mechanism of the surgical robot influenced the operator's manner. Therefore, when designing the mechanism for a surgical robot, there is a need to consider how this influences the operator's manner.