The smart surgical robot developed by Wego Pharmaceutical Co Ltd, a leading healthcare technology supplier based in Weihai, Shandong province, is enabling the sophisticated applications for artificial intelligence in the healthcare industry.

Most of the operations performed by surgical robots are difficult and complicated, and the technical threshold is very high, and the research and development is extremely difficult. For a long time, medical robot technology has been monopolized by foreign countries, according to industry experts.

Wang Bingqiang, a senior manager from the company, said that Wego has invested heavily in the research and development of surgical robots. After more than 10 years of efforts, the company has conquered many key core technologies, and finally developed China's first "doctor" robot with independent intellectual property rights, and cracked the technical problems that have been monopolized by foreign countries for 20 years.

"The main hardware, software, materials and system design of the Wego surgical robot are all independently developed by domestic scientists and we want to let the public see the rise of domestic medical equipment," Wang noted.

According to Wang, surgical robots can improve doctors' abilities to perform surgeries with greater precision and accuracy. When a surgical robot performs surgery, the doctor is not in direct contact with the patient, but operating the robot with a lever on a console. The surgical instruments perform movements inside the patient's body to perform a surgical procedure.

In 2020, Niu Haitao, vice-president and professor of Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, performed a remote surgery using a 5G-enabled Wego smart robot at a hospital in Qingdao, Shandong province. A patient underwent the urological surgery in Anshun, Southwest China's Guizhou province, which is 3,000 kilometers away from Qingdao.

Niu Haitao, vice-president and professor of the Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, performs a remote surgery using a 5G-enabled Wego smart robot at a hospital in Qingdao, Shandong province, in September, 2020. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]