There have been some incredible advancements in medical technology over the past few decades, but one area where doctors still have challenges is with actually seeing inside the body.
Technologies like X-rays, ultrasounds, and MRIs can give a good picture of what is going on, but there are serious limitations to what the doctors can view.
Surgeons often end up having to perform incisions in order to get a real look at what is going on inside someone. This may be needed to diagnose a problem or make a plan for future surgeries to deal with issues.
Of course, this type of surgery, like all surgeries, comes with some added risk.
A startup company called Pillbot has developed technology to solve many of these issues.
The company has developed a small robot that is about the size of a multivitamin. It can be controlled using its pump jet thrusters, which are directed using a remote control by a doctor.
Once the patient swallows the robot, it will begin live streaming video so that the doctor can take a look at what is going on inside the body in real time.
To show off this new technology, Alex Luebke, one of the company’s co-founders, performed a Ted Talk. On the talk, he actually swallowed one of the robots and had a doctor maneuver it around his stomach, giving his audience a true inside look.
During the talk, he said:
“Since the beginning of the modern era, the only way to really look inside was through rudimentary surgeries. Over the past 150 years or so, we’ve had great technologies that allow us to look from the outside, like X-rays and MRIs. But what I propose and what I’d like us to explore today is looking at micro-robotics inside the human body.”
While the robot is in use, doctors can either use it to look for unknown problems, or to get an extended view of known issues to help develop a treatment plan.
Currently, this robot is small enough to travel throughout the digestive system, which can be very helpful for people suffering from a wide-range of different issues.
It seems likely that as the miniaturization technology continues to advance, eventually it will be possible to have a robot traveling through the bloodstream or even through other tissues to find problems throughout the body.
Once the doctor is done viewing the footage from the robot, it can be left in place until the body expels it naturally.
They claim that this is a safe process, and Luebke explains:
“And no, you don’t feel anything when the robot moves around inside you.”
You can watch the full Ted Talk here:
How would you like to have a robot camera traveling through your body?
I, for one, am not quite sure.
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