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The Internet Technology

Laser Surgery Goes Online 198

Posted by samzenpus from the put-your-eye-in-the-disk-tray dept.
Ignat writes "Scientists in Australia successfully performed a laser surgery in a Southern California laboratory via the Internet. RoboLase, the new technology used showed that realtime surgeries can be performed from distant locations. Scientists from UC Irvine, UC San Diego and the University of Queensland used RoboLase to produce surgical holes in a distinct pattern of less than one micron in diameter (1/1000th of a millimeter) in single cells."
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Laser Surgery Goes Online More

Laser Surgery Goes Online

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  • Geez, what happens if the computer crashes? (Score:3, Funny)

    by The I Shing ( 700142 ) * on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:38PM (#13344688) Journal
    Kinda gives new meaning to the phrase blue screen of death, doesn't it? Ba dum bum! Thank you very much, I'll be here all week! Remember to tip your bartender!

    • Stupid Receptionist! (Score:4, Funny)

      by GuitarNeophyte ( 636993 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:49PM (#13344757) Homepage Journal
      I'm sorry, Mr Smith. The receptionist clogged up our bandwidth with illegal P2P downloading while we were making the incision. So, uh, it's just a tad off. Sorry.

      Luke
      ----
      Have friends and family that don't understand computers? Don't want to explain them? Send them to ChristianNerds.com [christiannerds.com], the Easy-to-Understand Computer Encyclopedia.

    • RIAA.....er....AMA (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      What happens if hackers sniff the packets, save the procedure to a file, create a torrent, and distribute the surgery all over the internet?

      The artist...er..doctors won't get paid for their work.

    • Future post at bash.org (Score:5, Funny)

      by grolschie ( 610666 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:58PM (#13344814)
      <doctor> And now I make my first incision
      <nurse> Nice work there Doctor.
      <doctor>.
      <doctor>.
      <doctor> DIE DIE DIE!!!!
      * stab stab stab *
      <nurse> What the hell are you doing!!!!???!!
      <nurse> You've made a freakin' mess. There's bloody all over the theatre!
      <nurse> Somebody help!!!!!!!!
      <doctor> .
      <doctor> Sorry was AFK and my little brother was messing with my pc
      • [doctor] And now I will make my first incisision.
        [Leroy AFK] ...
        [doctor] I'm going to try to go in through the left ventricle and remove the blockage. Nurse, can you run some numbers for us?
        [Leroy AFK] ...
        [nurse] Well, I say you have a 32.33% chance of success this time, repeating of course.
        [doctor] Well, that's better than usual. We should...
        [Leroy] Okay, let's do this! LEROOOOOOOOOOOOY JAHNKAIANSSS!!!!!!
        [doctor] Did...did he just go in?
        [nurse] Not again...
        [doctor] Leroy, you dumbass!
        [Leroy] At least I hav

    • Re:Geez, what happens if the computer crashes? (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I support our troops more than you do.

      Sir, I doubt that. I've got five balanced on my shoulders (in a nice pyramid) as I type this.
    • I was wondering if packet loss can cause cell loss. Hopefully they use Burnproof buffer underrun protection.

      And you know how dirty keyboards are, so I hope the surgeon washes his hands, and uses a new keyboard each time.
    • Now imagine another editorial like "Internet heart surgery going underway" and the knife-holding computer being /.-ed...
    • Seems to me like a legitimate concern. The fact is, computers aren't perfect, and the Internet is anything _but_ the perfect real time medium for something like this.

      If I'm to look at just my experience with WoW, I got disconnected three times in half an hour at one point yesterday. All of a sudden there'd be no more packets coming, and about half a minute later the game would finally get the clue and disconnect me. Was someone playing with a router along the way? I wouldn't know.

      Stuff like that happens on

  • i cant wait (Score:5, Funny)

    by penguinix ( 861079 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:38PM (#13344689)
    i can't wait for my doctor to be outsourced to India.
    • Hrm... for the equipment to make this possible, they would have to put in quite a bit of cash to make that possible, so if the doctors over there are so good that it would make it worth outsourcing to them, I'd say go for it!

      Luke
      ----
      ChristianNerds.com, the Easy-to-Understand Computer Encyclopedia [christiannerds.com]
    • Most-likely, the real reason it won't get outsourced will be medical insurance. Doctors over here have to have so much malpractice insurance that it's uber expensive, but most of our health insurance companies wouldn't allow for remote surgeries from areas where they wouldn't be able to check up on/sue the person on the other end.

      However, if you're rich enough, I guess it'd be possible, but then again, if you're rich, you wouldn't need it outsourced to lower costs.

      Luke
      ----
      ChristianNerds.com, the Free, [christiannerds.com]

    • Re:i cant wait (Score:3, Informative)

      by Sethus ( 609631 )
      I actually asked a good friend of the family about this (a radiologist), why can't they outsource doctors? At the least radiologists, since all they have to do is read xray films! To an extent, some places already do, for instance, in the past doctors had to be on call all night long, ready to read films, sleep very badly, and generally screw up their sleep scheduals. Now they just send the pictures to Australia past 11pm.

      But when I asked him about outsourcing, he gave me two good reasons why it'd neve

    • Re:i cant wait (Score:5, Insightful)

      by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @11:45PM (#13345022)
      i can't wait for my doctor to be outsourced to India.
      Sarcasm or no, I happen to agree. You hardly ever see the doctor anyways. Analyzing lab results and scans is something that can easily be done remotely.

      Cutting and sewing will probably be the last things outsourced, but you know what? Medical care is currently so expensive that many people in some parts of the world simply go without. Better to take your chances than die for sure.

    • i can't wait for my doctor to be outsourced to India.

      There was a program on one of the commercial teevee networks a few days ago that showed how many people, Americans included, are taking medical vacations in Thailand. Seems the price of a doctor's visit there is around twenty bucks, and the doctors, for the most part, are American educated and trained. The cost for treatment is generally one-third to one-half of that stateside, and post-op recovery can be relaxing in luxury hotel style accomodations, o
  • Who's gonna be the first sucker?

    GaaaAAAggghhh, My eye!!!

  • Bandwidth or Latency (Score:5, Informative)

    by matt21811 ( 830841 ) * on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:39PM (#13344694) Homepage
    "This was a particularly noteworthy accomplishment, because it demonstrated the amount of computer bandwidth (1 gigabyte/second) needed by the Australia and California research groups to observe and grab a fast-moving sperm with virtually no detectible delay in image transmission between the two laboratories."

    It seems even the people who did this have no idea of the difference between bandwidth and latency. The above quote is from the original press release.

    When I first read the title I thought someone had their lasik done this way, mostly because my wife had her lasik surgery done in Australia (we live there). She wrote about the experience http://www.sharonslasiksurgery.com/ [sharonslasiksurgery.com] if you want a laypersons point of view.

    Doing it remotely is not something I would volunteer for and I suppose that is exactly where this technology is heading.
    • Precisely. I hope they have enough forethought to do laser pulses with preset durations rather than something crazy like having to wait for a kill signal. That would, presumably, be bad time to have a connection lag or drop.
    • Laser surgery can control cells in your body. Lasik mainly refers to the eye. I think the article is pointing out more than the potential of improving Lasik eye procedures... which last I checked at www.lasikdisaster.com is filled with stories.

      • If you think the article was about Lasik, you didn't read it =) Not one mention of Lasik, at all. They grabbed some sperm with lasers, and they performed laser procedures on single cells.

        However, about Lasik - there's been people that have had bad experiences with it. While I feel terrible for it, it's not the procedure that's the problem, it's the people doing it. More importantly, it's the diagnosis beforehand. Not everyone should do Lasik. Some eyes just won't do well with the procedure. Unfortun
        • The real problem is so many people having lasik to fix slight problems. If you only barely need glasses, lasik is an unnecessary risk. Get contacts, or just wear glasses. Unless your eyes are extremely bad, it is not a smart idea to do surgery on them, since any surgery has a risk of failure.
    • On the contrary it would require both high bandwidth and low latency. Latency is not so much the issue, as with a small ammount of data it can be brought down to insignificant levels.

      The issue is bringing a large ammount of data at the same near zero latency. The precise movements of a robot, and the high resolution images from high-zoom microscopes. Try that with a 1200 baud modem. Not happening with near zero latency. You need the speed to 1) compete with other signals 2) pipe a large ammount of data.
      • latancy would be bloody important in this case:

        doctor: START_CUTTING (ping time 5ms)
        server: STARTING_CUTTING(ping time 5ms)
        doctor: LEFT_A_BIT(ping time 5ms)
        doctor: LEFT_A_BIT(ping time 5ms)
        doctor: LEFT_A_BIT(ping time 5ms)
        doctor: STOP (ping time 1s)

        that would cause a patient to lose a lot of the left side of whatever it was that was being opened up.

        • This will put the whining about ping delays, widespread among players of Quake-like games, onto a completely new level.

          Also, just guess what will happen if a router is using MS software and goes onto its monthly reboot. In normal cases, things will get routed around in no noticeable time, but in this cases, the downtime won't end in just a rocket that you fail to dodge.

          I can't see it used over public Internet. It's simply WAAAY too unreliable.

    • "This was a particularly noteworthy accomplishment, because it demonstrated the amount of computer bandwidth (1 gigabyte/second) needed by the Australia and California research groups to observe and grab a fast-moving sperm with virtually no detectible delay in image transmission between the two laboratories."

      It seems even the people who did this have no idea of the difference between bandwidth and latency. The above quote is from the original press release.

      I don't think they're confused at all. That

    • I read your wife's site, but I couldn't help but notice that the aftermath is missing from the report : Did she have any pains after the Lasik operation ? Did irritations occur ? How long did it take before it was all healed ?

      As the site's purpose seems to be to inform people of those eye-laser surgeries, information as this is necesary for me to get a good view of the overall process.

      And did I understand it right that the whole procedure gets done without an anestethic (sp?) ? Or did she leave that part

      • It's great to get an independent review.
        I'll get Sharon to add the requested missing bits. Yes, they use anesthetic. You'd hope so cause they cut an access lid in the "skin" on the eye! She said she dont feel any pain during the surgery but you have discomfort aferwards. She was extremely light sensitive. Check back at the site in a week and I'll have uploaded what she has to say about the rest.
        Thanks for your comments!
    • ...it demonstrated the amount of computer bandwidth (1 gigabyte/second) needed by the Australia and California research groups...

      Now I know what I can add to my proposal to upgrade our network at work:With our new gigabit network, it will now be possible to offer remote lasik operations for all employees. Sweet.

  • No thanks! (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I don't want nobody to DDOS my eyeball thank you very much.

  • This Should Lower Every MD's Handicap (Score:3, Funny)

    by Quirk ( 36086 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:40PM (#13344698) Homepage Journal
    "RoboLase, the new technology used showed that realtime surgeries can be performed from distant locations."

    So we can expect to see RoboLase terminals on golf courses real soon.

  • Alittle lag and... (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    OMG MY EYE!

  • Linksys Router (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mean_Nishka ( 543399 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:41PM (#13344704) Homepage Journal
    Will this work with my Linksys router?

  • Great... (Score:2, Funny)

    by MrFlannel ( 762587 )
    Now we're going to need tin foil sunglasses to protect us from "free trials" of LASIK from spam?

    The first eye's free!
  • This is great, soon I can call India from the U.S. and get someone to both fix my Dell and perform surgery. I just hope the link doesn't go down during the operation.

    Laugh, it's funny, ok?

  • Mini me... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Stormwatch ( 703920 ) <`moc.liamtoh' `ta' `oarigogirdor'> on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:47PM (#13344747) Homepage
    ...stop humping the "laser". Maybe you and the "laser" should go get a freakin room.

  • laser surgery via internet and the Snow Crash... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wherrera ( 235520 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:49PM (#13344756) Journal
    Yeah, this means it won't be long before a computer worm can really, directly kill someone ;-/
    • Eye see what you mean... Will the medical students learning this have a good teacher pupil relationship?
      Truth is, my understanding is that a lot of these surgeries are done with computers anyhow, just in thisb case the computer/doc-operator are far away. I am sure there will be nurses etc w/ the patient. I don't think that there will be a feature in Vista that allows us to get surgery at home.
      It would be convenient however, to get a vasectomy online.
      It seems like the doctors and IT pros are suffering fr
  • After been killed multiple times on WOW, this lag could really kill you.... mmh... better not get Blizzard to do the Server.

  • OK... (Score:1)

    by BJH ( 11355 )
    ...who's first up with the bad pingtime jokes?

  • Dropped Packets? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by alfrin ( 858861 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @10:50PM (#13344769)
    I would imagine if some packets were lost, or lag? It is inevitable, would you really want to risk it with that?
    • Well, for the visual updates a dropped packet might not be as critical as in the transfer of data that moves the equipment. For that, I'd assume that they've got some decent error-checking or CRC going on.

  • Lag (Score:1)

    by unixbum ( 720776 )
    Doctor Performing minor incision on a patients arm (Ping: 60ms)
    ...
    Patient: MY ARM, YOU CUT OFF MY ARM!!! (Ping 800Ms)
    Doctor: Damn Lag!!!!!!!!
  • How has redundancy been implemented? Have these bright people considered a fact that a Distributed Denial of Service or DDoS attack could potentially be fatal to a soul on the surgery table?
  • Batman!

    KFG

  • contain your astonishment... (Score:3, Funny)

    by moviepig.com ( 745183 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @11:06PM (#13344855)
    "...our colleagues in Australia ... have been able to identify and trap a targeted sperm under the laser microscope in the California laboratory."

    Though this achievement doubtless strikes fear into the hearts of fugitive sperm everywhere... it's hard to see it as a breakthrough. In other words... it's unlikely that there was ever much doubt about the success of this "demonstration", since any glitch would likely have been met by a mere retry. And, in still other words... do you feel even microscopically better about the prospect of, say, your next airline flight's pilot relaxing at a cable-modem in his condo?

    • And, in still other words... do you feel even microscopically better about the prospect of, say, your next airline flight's pilot relaxing at a cable-modem in his condo?

      To play devil's advocate for a bit....

      Say there's a loss of cabin pressure. (This may have been the cause of the recent air crash in Greece.) The pilot will still have lots of oxygen, full consciousness, and full control of the aircraft.

      Suppose there's a hijacking attempt. You can't put a knife to the throat of a pilot who isn't ther

  • Now the words "OMFG LAG!" really is a matter of life and death...
  • error 404 the surgeon who was messing with your insides can no longer be found try pressing the refresh button, if the problem persists contact your network administrator...
  • I for one welcome our new lasik overlords!
  • I've been meaning to get circumcised lately, but I think I'll wait until this procedure is a bit more mature before I subject my manhood to it.

  • Medical students should be learning Chinese and at least one East Indian dialect as part of their major. And prepare to emigrate overseas!
  • for teh win!!!!1!

  • Nice in principle, lousy in practice (Score:3, Insightful)

    by davidwr ( 791652 ) on Wednesday August 17, 2005 @11:41PM (#13345006) Homepage Journal
    I see "remote surgery" and even AI-assisted remote surgery as the future for battlefields, outer space, and other conditions where surgery must be done quickly but the doctor cannot get to the operating room.

    However, latency and quality-of-service issues will need to be addressed before this is anything more than experimental.

  • I'm sorry but I think a Doctor carving on someone should at least be on the same continent. If he's carving on me he WILL be in the same room.

    After two cervical spine and four knee surgeries I know way more about doctors and medicine than I ever wanted to. Thats why I now have time to program and work on computers, this beat up old body won't do much else anymore. The scars on my knees are older than most reading /. (26 - 33 years).
  • I guess it would give the phrase "do not look into laser with remaining eye" a whole new meaning

  • it's not "surgery" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cahiha ( 873942 ) on Thursday August 18, 2005 @12:34AM (#13345206)
    They poked tiny holes into cells with a laser. Calling that "cell surgery" doesn't make it surgery; it's just operating a scientific instrument remotely over the Internet. People have been doing that for years.
  • does this mean doctors and surgeons can be outsourced now?
  • While isolated tests like these are all well and good, can the internet that we know and love (or hate) today, really accomodate and maintain the level of QOS to do this across the board?

    Newer, seperate internets, like Internet 2 I could see having long term functionality, but I really don't think it's sustainable on the existing networks.

  • Unfortunately, the rush of /.'ers surging to watch the surgery online /.'ed their servers, and patients dialing in for surgery have receieved 405 errors (Doctor not found).

    In other news, one town has offered $50 surgerical procedures from 4 year old doctors, and the resulting stampede has created an infinite loop of supply and demand.

  • Touch eyeballs to screen for cheap laser surgery.
  • And now I'll make a careful incision into the hea[BUFFERING 67%]
  • Here come the patent lawyers!

    Doing laser surgery . . .

    . . . OVER THE INTERNET
  • Please let there not be a packet dropped during my laser eye surgery!

  • Love the internet for laser eye surgery... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mr. Flibble ( 12943 ) on Thursday August 18, 2005 @03:32AM (#13345787) Homepage
    So the doctor begins adjusting the power of the beam and turns on the laser just as a lag spike hits. The computer continually increaes the laser power... then the delayed UDP message to "fire" the laser arrives...

    The doctor stares bewildered at his monitor as the word HEADSHOT! is returned...

    (Then a remote nurse claims he has an aimbot...)

    • Happy 30th Birthday Logan

      It is time to be renewed. Just let me hook up this nifty internet surgery thingy. Don't worry these lasers are fool proof...

      There is no reason to run off. This *always* works.

  • I can see the first lawsuit.

    California Hospitol and Aussie Dr. sued due to lag. The victim was cited as saying, "I shoulda gone with those HPF's".
  • But I'll trust this when one of the researchers claiming success has his/her own (critical, sensitive to failure) surgery using this method.
  • ... is National Instruments' LabVIEW [ni.com]. Amazing stuff.
  • I want to perform laser surgery out of a shrunken-down micro submersible, injected into someone's bloodstream!

    A female assistant with a tight scuba suit would also help...
  • This is all just a really big scam. The truth is, some researcher got PWN3D a few months ago at Q3, and set about to get the best ping times he possibly could.

    This is what you get when you headshot GreyHats, people!!! Do not taunt happy fun ball!!!
  • ...you first.
  • "showed that realtime surgeries can be performed from distant locations. "

    so when can i get one in drive-thru?

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