Zhang Songgen, founder of Tinavi, delivers a speech. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Since the success of the first robot-assisted neurosurgical brain biopsy in 1985, the technology of medical robotics has made significant progress.

From industrial robots to specialized robots, from simple positioning functions to multi-functional and remote surgical operations, the technologies and system of medical robots have possessed their own development characteristics, forming a new frontier field.

The orthopedic surgery robot is a subdivision of medical robots, which can realize more personalized surgical design and simulation, and provide more accurate surgical positioning than humans, thereby effectively reducing the risk of complications, improving the quality of surgery, and shortening the postoperative recovery period, to reduce overall medical expenses.

Super assistant of orthopedic surgery

In the past, orthopedic surgery has long been restricted by the inaccuracy of human eyes and hands. In 2013, the third-generation Tinavi orthopedic surgery robot was born, which was composed of the robotic arm, optical tracking system, and trolley controller.

This orthopedic surgery robot can not only help doctors complete the planning of the surgical path, but can also accurately guide the implantation of internal plants, significantly reducing the incidence of intraoperative and postoperative complications, and greatly reducing patients’ exposure to intraoperative radiation.

In addition, the Tinavi robot can guide the surgeon within 1mm accuracy, which is 1.5 mm to 2 mm more accurate than its two competitors in the world.

Tinavi scores a notable success

In 2015, with the help of Tinavi, Tian Wei, dean of Beijing Jishuitan Hospital and his team successfully completed the surgery of upper cervical spine malformation (upper cervical spine is often referred to as "vital center").

A 43-year-old patient diagnosed with severe congenital atlantoaxial malformation and basilar depression successfully underwent surgery with an error of less than 1 mm.

This is the world's first robot-assisted upper cervical spine surgery.

In the global medical field, spinal surgery has always been a tough issue in the orthopedic surgery community.

Due to the enormous technical difficulties and high risks of the surgery, the patient couldn’t go anywhere to seek medical treatment before. But now, Tinavi gives the surgeon high-stability "hands" and high-precision "eyes" through intelligent technology, giving hope to such desperate patients.