Comfort and learnability assessment of a new soft robotic manipulator for minimally invasive surgery

Abstract

Laparoscopic surgeons perform precise and time consuming procedures while holding awkward poses in their upper body and arms. There is an ongoing effort to produce robotic tools for laparoscopic surgery that will simplify these tasks and reduce risk of errors to help both the surgeon and the patient. STIFF-FLOP is an ongoing EU FP7 project focusing on this by creating a stiffness controllable soft robotic manipulator. This paper reports on a study to test the soft manipulator's learnability and the effort associated with its use. The tests involved a limited prototype of the manipulator with a custom built test rig and EMG acquisition system. Task times and video recordings along with EMG waveforms from the forearm muscles of participants (n=25) were measured for objective assessment. A questionnaire was also provided to the participants for subjective assessment. The data shows that in average EMG levels were 25.9% less in RMS when using the STIFF-FLOP arm than when conventional laparoscopic tools were used. In terms of learnability, from the first to the second attempt on the STIFF-FLOP manipulator, elapsed time was reduced by an average of 32.1%. Further details and analysis of the EMG signals as well as time and questionnaire results is presented in the paper.

Analysis of comfort and ergonomics for clinical work environments

“…Filling in questionnaires and going through look-up tables allows for a quick assessment and requires minimal training. This is in contrast to using EMG, which provides objective measures of a person's behaviour and effort [13], but remains mostly exclusive to hospitals and laboratories and is not used as a day to day tool due to its complexity and obtrusiveness. However, with advances in implementing electrophysiological sensors as wearable devices [14], their regular use in the near future seems possible.…”

Embroidered Electromyography: A Systematic Design Guide

“…Surface EMG can be used on the legs to monitor leg muscle activity and fatigue during exercise -this is done as proof of concept in this paper as well as used in ventilatory threshold detection during incremental running in [3]. It can also be used to monitor ergonomics through the status of the muscles in people with jobs involving continuous stances to warn of potentially unhealthy postures [4], or as an assessment tool to examine comfort in jobs involving precise tasks with special or heavy tools, long hours and unusual postures leading to a difficult lifestyle, e.g., surgeons [5]. This is better achievable through a wearable platform.…”