A recent study discovered medical robotic surgical machines were linked to nearly 1,400 injuries and at least 144 deaths. The study researchers called for improved safety standards for machines to ensure human welfare, but others disagree. Do we trust robots too much? Is it safe to entrust them with our lives? (image via CDC)
A recent study conducted by the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, MIT and Chicago’s Rush University Medical Center discovered that robotic surgical machines were linked to at least 144 deaths and nearly 1,400 injuries over a 14-year-period. In a world where innovators continue to rely upon robotic technology, we must wonder if entrusting human lives with machines is safe. It’s a question few are willing to ask.
According to the study, researchers discovered that in 1.7 million medical procedures involving machines, more than 8,000 malfunctioned. These errors included machines turning off, losing parts (inside of patients), losing control of movement and dropping video feeds. If this isn’t nightmarish enough, these malfunctions were linked to at least 400 injuries and at least four deaths.
Critics of the study said the researchers failed to cross-analyze data to determine if outside factors contributed to injuries or death, such as state of being prior to procedure and medical history. They say the study results are misleading, as robotic procedures offer other benefits, such as allowing doctors to make smaller incisions, thus expediting a patient’s healing process. Still, researchers stand by the data, warning that doctors should trust less in the promise of machines.
While the study did not prove machines were directly responsible for the deaths to which they are linked, it did prove that machines have at least undoubtedly injured hundreds of patients, including burns. More importantly, perhaps, it forces us to ask ourselves if our trust in machines is in fact well-earned.
The industrial sector provides primary examples of the dangers of working closely with machines. Deaths linked to machines and equipment accounted for 16 percent of all deaths reported by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2013. Deaths linked to falling, slipping and tripping accounted for an additional 16 percent. Since the inception of industrial machines, stories have surfaced of people being crushed and ripped apart by machine malfunctions. Still, we further develop robotics for our convenience. Be it autonomous automobiles or smart homes, when will we ask ourselves the true cost of convenience? Is safety for ease-of-use a fair trade?
The research study team warned not that we forget microsurgery altogether, but rather that we improve safety standards for machines that can control the outcome between life and death. For all machines that come into such close contact with people, we must consider the possibility that machines are machines, and may malfunction. We must consider all consequences before allowing laziness to impede our personal safety. Although critics of the study, and this argument, may disagree, people will continue to die unless measures are taken to improve machine safety. That is the ugly, and unfortunate, truth.
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