How Dr. Torres Slays “RoboBee”
Tiny robots cannot replace Callie!
Sara Ramirez’s portrayal of Callie Torres made her one of the fan favorite for the last ten years! As yet another original cast leaves one of the longest running shows in television history, it’s time to reflect on what made Dr. Torres the best surgeon of Seattle’s Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital.
What is a “RoboBee”?
Smaller aerial drones are often limited by its battery life due to its size. Tiny robots are invaluable for surveying areas or underground tunnels that are dangerous or impossible for humans to inspect. Existing applications for tiny robots include border patrol and search and rescue. The size restriction prevents these tiny robots from being able to carry a large battery. The short battery life makes it difficult to use for longer term observational projects and expeditions.
Harvard Microrobotics Laboratory pioneered a new way to save energy. The RoboBee, a tiny bee-like drone, was recently developed with an innovative way to extend its battery life via static electricity. This new mechanism allows the drones to perch using electrostatic adhesion to save battery life and extend the length of its mission. Perching is very common in nature, especially for insects and birds. This reinvention allows for even more opportunities for these tiny devices, from manufacturing to micro-surgery.
Are robots that much better?
If doctors are trained solely to perform repetitive procedures efficiently and recognize patterns, then robots are much more capable. Robots are able to perform precise actions and calculations with significantly lower error rates while removing any fatigue-induced errors from long surgeries. The robot pharmacists installed at the University of California in San Francisco made only 1 wrong prescription out of 6 million versus the 60,000 (1%) that humans would have made. Furthermore, robots have also demonstrated their independence in performing a simple stitch without guidance at Children’s National Medical Center and Johns Hopkins University. While this is still a long way from reality, “truly autonomous robotic surgery will raise new ethical issues…as well as requiring new definitions for surgical competence, credentialing, and privileges to perform surgery”.
However, doctors do much more than simply repeating procedures and recognize patterns. Physicians often rely on intuitions that are not necessarily programmable for a robot. Whereas a robot may need one hundred percent certainty before pursuing a solution, doctors often have to act with much less certainty and time. Additionally, human interaction helps with diagnoses as well. The human touch, literally, provides the necessary haptic feedback for physicians to detect and protect essential structures. Medical diagnoses and surgery require emotional intelligence that is difficult for robots to replicate.
The Callie Factor
Dr. Torres’s creativity is unparalleled. It is not a trait that could easily be replaced by any tiny robot in the near future! Aside from being invited to the prestigious TED Talk, she also helped amputees walk again and, most recently, saved a veteran by amputating one leg and reconnecting the other to the middle of his body. Callie slays RoboBees any day!
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