Ergonomic interface concepts for minimally invasive, remote, and virtual surgical systems

Traditional open surgical techniques require a surgeon to assume a posture of leaning over the patient with a direct eye-to-hand perspective. As new minimally invasive and remote surgical procedures evolve, the surgeon is not required to maintain the same posture as in open techniques. While more ergonomic postures may be facilitated, some current remote systems have maintained surgeon configurations that are small variants of legacy postures (e.g., maintaining the eye to hand perspective). While the legacy configuration may be more familiar with some surgeons, studies have indicated that it can result in excessive fatigue. Robotics and human factors researchers have determined that fatigue due to inefficiencies in operator interfaces lead to longer completion times and increased task execution errors. This paper discusses operator interface design issues and guidelines that are relevant to remote and minimally invasive surgery, and presents one possible operator interface solution based on the compact remote console deployed for environmental restoration and remote handling of hazardous nuclear waste.