The first telerobotic PCI was conducted using CorPath telerobotic technology. The first telerobotic percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) was conducted on December 4 and 5, 2018, in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India using CorPath telerobotic technology. The remote PCI was performed on 5 patients at the Apex Heart Institute who underwent the procedure roughly 20 miles away from the operating physician. Tejas Patel, MD, chief interventional cardiologist and chairman of the Apex Heart Institute performed the procedure. “The first in human cases of remote robotic PCI represent a landmark event for interventional medicine,” said Dr Patel in a press release. “The application of telerobotics in India has the potential to impact a significant number of lives by providing access to care that may not otherwise have been possible.” Mark Toland, President and CEO of Corindus added, “As a result of existing barriers to care, including increased global poverty and a declining number of trained specialists, only a fraction of patients worldwide receives life-saving treatment.” Corindus Vascular Robotics is behind the telerobotic intervention, developing the platform to deliver “highly specialized and timely cardiovascular care to underserved patient populations with geographic barriers to treatment.” Commercial product development of the CorPath system is set to begin, and the company intends to expand their robotic intervention platform to address stroke care. Source
