UK Surgeons Perform First Robotic Eye Operation

                British surgeons have carried out the world’s first robotic operation inside the eye – potentially revolutionizing the way vision conditions are treated. Patient said his eyesight was retuning following the procedure, having previously experienced distorted vision similar to “looking in a hall of mirrors at a fairground”. The procedure was carried out by surgeons at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital. The robotic eye surgery trial involves 12 patients undergoing operations with increasing complexity. On completing the operation, surgeon said: “We have just witnessed a vision of eye surgery in the future. Current technology with laser scanners and microscopes allows us to monitor retinal diseases at the microscopic level, but the things we see are beyond the physiological limit of what the human hand can operate on. With a robotic system, we open up a whole new chapter of eye operations that currently cannot be performed.” It was the first time a device had been available that achieved the three dimensional precision required to operate inside the human eye.