Impact of COVID-19 on Medical Robotics and Wearables Research
Learning from the Past and Strategizing for the Future
June 4, 2021
About the workshop
During the last several months of the most serious public health crisis of the century, the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers in the area of intelligent robotics and smart wearables have published a series of articles showing the great potential of utilizing modern technologies to mitigate the virus spread, conduct early diagnosis, minimize the risk of infection between citizens and between patients and doctors, and aid and equip healthcare systems. COVID-19 has resulted in a major interruption to a wide range of spectrum of care, including elective surgeries and post-stroke rehabilitation. In this workshop, we collect expert opinions from leaders who have been actively contributing to the fight against COVID-19 with the goal of raising awareness on how future research in intelligent medical robotics and smart wearables can empower healthcare systems during the upcoming waves of this pandemic and upcoming pandemics. The workshop will be composed of a collection of talks in addition to round-table discussion and poster sessions. This workshop aims to bring together researchers and stakeholders from academia and industry to generate a unique environment focusing on the future of modern healthcare and the contribution of medical robotics, AI, and smart wearable research.
Content
COVID-19 has shown that healthcare systems across the world were unprepared for addressing such a major public health crisis. The shock challenged the control of the infection and severely interrupted the delivery of non-COVID-19 care (such as surgery and rehabilitation). The unfortunate tragedy that COVID-19 has caused should serve as a catalyst to promote discussions for reconsidering, at a more fundamental level, the paradigms of healthcare delivery and how more extensive, targeted, and deliberate use of technology can reduce the loss of human lives and alleviate the burden on the healthcare staff. This requires a discussion between leading researchers, the industrial sector, and young researchers to re-think the future of research in robotics, AI, and smart wearables for healthcare. This workshop provides a unique venue for such an imperative unmet need. The workshop collects expert opinions from leading researchers who have been actively discussing and investigating how integrated and intelligent robots, autonomous systems, and smart wearables could play a significant positive role during the pandemic and after that through facilitating the diagnosis, prevention, containment, and mitigation in addition to providing general support for patients and medical staff to alleviate the non‐COVID‐19 burden accumulated during the crisis. This workshop will be a unique forum to also discuss how the integrated future of research and education in medical robotics and smart wearables should be shaped to better aid the healthcare system, healthcare workers, and patients during the next waves of the pandemic and future pandemics. This workshop will recognize how integrated robotic and wearable technologies combined with machine intelligence and autonomy have the excellent yet untapped potential for meeting the needs of a safer, more robust, and more efficient delivery of care.
This workshop will argue that the technological paradigm change in healthcare deserves particular discussion, attention, and research with higher enthusiasm and systematic planning. This workshop intends to initiate discussions between researchers and send a strong message to policymakers and stakeholders and motivate young researchers and students to further invest in and investigate the use of Robotics, AI, and Smart solutions, in an integrated manner for empowering healthcare systems. Topics of interest include:
Robotic autonomy and AI for Robust Delivery of Care
Modern Telehealth and Telemedicine
Horizons of Telesurgery
Future of Telerehabilitation
Adoption of Smart Wearables for predictive diagnosis and tracing
Mission Statement
In this workshop, we aim at encouraging an interactive and interdisciplinary dialog between young researchers, leaders, and the industrial sector, to find ethical and practical technological solutions to effectively and more preparedly tackle similar crises in the future. In addition to invited presentations by leaders in the field, we will have posters and elevator pitches for young researchers and students in addition to interactive discussions during the panel to provide the young researcher with a unique opportunity to discuss and disseminate their viewpoints and interact with senior leaders in the field.
Invited Speakers
Paolo Fiorini, Department of Computer Science, University of Verona Ca' Vignal 2, Italy
Neville Hogan, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA
Ka-Wai Kwok, Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Mahdi Tavakoli, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Canada
Jessica Burgner-Kahrs, Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto, Canada
Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College London, UK
Call For Posters (Brief Papers) - CLOSED
We welcome poster submissions in the form of brief papers that are related to the scope of the workshop.
Papers may represent under-review, unpublished or recently published research.Please send 2-page papers in IEEE paper format to <mahdi.tavakoli@ualberta.ca>.The accepted 2-page papers will be published on the workshop website.The accepted papers will NOT appear in the official proceedings of the conference.Authors will be asked to record and submit a 3-minute video to present the work.The pre-recorded presentation videos will be posted to YouTube and linked on the workshop website.The pre-recorded presentation videos will also be played at the elevator pitch session of the workshop.
Important Dates
Submission of Brief Paper: April 25, 2021
Notification of Acceptance: May 5, 2021
Final Submission of Brief Paper and Presentation Video: May 15, 2010
Workshop Date: June 4, 2021
Organizing Committee
Mahdi Tavakoli, Professor,
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Canada.
Email: mahdi.tavakoli@ualberta.ca
S. Farokh Atashzar, Assistant Professor, Departments of Electrical and Computer Eng. & Mechanical and Aerospace Eng., New York University, USA.
Email: f.atashzar@nyu.edu
Kaspar Althoefer, Professor,
School of Electronic Engineering & Computer Science, Queen Mary University of London, UK.
Email: k.althoefer@qmul.ac.uk
Paolo Fiorini, Professor,
Department of Computer Science, University of Verona Ca' Vignal 2, Italy.
Email: paolo.fiorini@univr.it
Sponsors
Schedule (Eastern Daylight Time)
8:40-9:00 EDT S. Farokh Atashzar (Opening)
9:00-9:20 EDT Neville Hogan, A fast track to the future: the pandemic foreshadows the needs of future care.
9:20-9:40 EDT Paolo Fiorini, Moving from autonomy to tele-autonomy: how current research on autonomous medical robots should be adapted to counteract the epidemics
9:40-10:00 EDT Ka-Wai Kwok, Teleoperated robotic tools via endoscope working channel
10:00-10:20 EDT Axel Krieger, From Testing Booths to ICU Robots: Coronovation at the Johns Hopkins University
10:20-10:40 EDT Break 1: Five Poster Presentations (Pre-recorded)
10:40-11:00 EDT Marcia O’Malley, Resilient research ecosystems during pandemic restrictions
11:00-11:20 EDT Elena De Momi, Further distancing the surgeon from the operating table: Towards the virtual hospital
11:20-11:40 EDT Ferdinando Rodriguez Baena, Innovation in Covid-related tech: the Imperial College Case Study
11:40-12:00 EDT Sanja Dogramadzi, Wearables and dexterity for robotic surgery
12:00-12:20 EDT Break 2: Sponsor Talk, Winner Poster Announcement
12:20-12:40 EDT Mahdi Tavakoli, Distancing-aware delivery of healthcare using robotics and AI
12:40-13:00 EDT Pietro Valdastri & Onaizah Onaizah, How robotics can help flexible endoscopy at the time of COVID-19
13:00-13:20 EDT Jessica Burgner-Kahrs & Hallie Siegel, The challenge of bottom-up vs. top-down research in light of a global pandemic
13:20-13:40 EDT Kaspar Althoefer, Low-cost soft and continuum healthcare robots during the COVID pandemic
13:40-14:20 EDT Round Table
Accepted Paper Presentations:
Poster #1:
Title: Telerobotic Operation of ICU Ventilators
Abstract: The novel coronavirus (SARC-CoV-2) has infected approximately 140 million people worldwide since December 2019 and claimed over 3 million human lives. The primary cause of severe symptoms is pneumonia that often requires patients to be placed on mechanical ventilation in intensive care units (ICU). Healthcare personnel may need to adjust ventilator settings several times an hour and each time they need to don and doff personal protective equipment (PPE) in order to enter a patient room, which strains PPE resources and significantly extends the time required to make adjustments. The problem could be alleviated by remotely controlling ventilators, however currently available ventilators do not have this capability. In this work, we describe the development of a teleoperated robotic system that enables the remote control of a ventilator from outside the patient room. The system comprises a simple Cartesian robot equipped with a stylus mounted on the touch screen of the ventilator and a remote controller software running on a tablet computer that controls the robot using wireless communication. Preliminary evaluation results show the potential for significant time and PPE savings by using the proposed robotic device with a common commercial ventilator.
Paper: Link.
Poster #2:
Title: Informative Path Planning for Automatic Robotic Auscultation
Abstract: We envision robot-assisted medical exams in which auscultation is performed. This is a challenging task as doctors need to identify anatomical landmarks and cope with bones and body fat which might affect sound quality. To this end, we developed an automated system that gauges sound quality and picks auscultation locations to achieve high enough quality to identify symptoms of disease. It is based on a heart/lung sound quality estimator trained offline; with online patient registration and Bayesian optimization to select auscultation locations. Experiments show that it performs faster than a human operator teleoperating the robot and achieves better sound quality.
Paper: Link.
Poster #3:
Title: Addressing the COVID-19 Healthcare Needs by Teleoperated Robot-assisted Intervention
Abstract: In this article, initially the fundamental changes to the procedural routines of the interventional surgeries in response to the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed. Afterward, a summary of the system architecture of robot-assisted interventional systems is provided and followed by the authors’ technological developments to alleviate robot-assisted cardiovascular intervention’s limitations. Also, the contributions of the recent developments to the compliance with COVID-19-related safety measures are discussed. In the end, future research directions for adaptation to the post-COVID healthcare paradigm shift are provided.
Paper: Link.
Poster #4:
Title: Tuning of Drone PD Controller Parameters for Medical Supplies Delivery
Abstract: During the COVID-19 pandemic and similar outbreaks in the future, drones can be set up to reduce human interaction for medical supplies delivery, which is crucial in times of pandemic. In this short paper, we introduce the use
of two evolutionary algorithms for multi-objective optimization (MOO) and tuning the parameters of the PD controller of a drone to follow the 3D desired path.
Paper: Link.
Poster #5:
Title: Intrinsically Soft, Stretchable Pressure Sensors for Soft Robotics and Implantable Neural Prosthetics
Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored the need for medical soft robotics to provide contactless treatment and for implantable neural prosthetics (INPs) to reduce the demand for long-term care. Both technologies require digitization of touch sensation on soft and stretchable robotic or human skin. Existing devices are limited by high mechanical stiffness, poor performance under strain, and poor biocompatibility. This paper presents two intrinsically soft, stretchable pressure sensors to meet these needs. The first is a strain-insensitive sensor for soft robotic skins; locally and biaxially stiffened micro-pyramids made from an ionic elastomer realize this capacitive sensor with a pressure sensitivity of 2.2 kPa^{-1} and 98% strain-unaltered performance up to 50%-strain. Implementation of this sensor in haptic interfaces for medical robots is demonstrated via a soft robotic hand for contactless palpation. The second is a biocompatible pressure sensor for INPs; sugar alcohol doped PEDOT:PSS electrodes, a novel superhydrophobic fluoropolymer coating, and micro-pyramids realize this sensitive, robust, and biocompatible resistive sensor for subcutaneous implantation and integration with an INP assembly.
Paper: Link.