Intuitive Surgical's da Vinci 5 Force Feedback Evaluated
3 JANUARY 2025
Prof. Andrew J. Hung and his team have published the results of a two-year study of the da Vinci 5 haptic feedback system. Their report: Novel force feedback technology improves suturing in roboticāassisted surgery: a preāclinical study was accepted on December 1, 2024 by Surgical Endoscopy. He announced the report on LinkedIn with these comments:
"Our new paper is one of the first out there on force feedback (FFB) technology with the #dV5. We studied the prototype robot almost 2 years before product launch and saw that FFB allowed less use of force, more efficiency, and less trauma, while suturing."
For the study, two groups of 'novice surgeons' performed robot assisted bladder and aorta suturing procedures on both dry, simulated tissue and on porcine models. Half used Intuitive Surgical's Force Feedback, the other half performed standard robotic surgery. In this preliminary study, the FFB-equipped procedures achieved better results.
From the Abstract: "FFB sensing significantly lowered the mean force applied..., average number of errors..., and the time
to completion... The FFB group applied less tissue trauma with a higher RACE skill score..."
