Surgeons employ robots in spinal operations

Robots have been used to make products, mend cars and serve coffee. Now their metal arms have reached to the operation table in China.

Chinese doctors recently made significant progress in fracture operations with the help of robots, with spinal surgeon Tian Wei of Beijing Jishuitan Hospital in October completing the world's first robot-aided operation on a patient with an odontoid fracture, a cervical injury that causes continuous pain and has a reported death rate of up to 11 percent.

In August, Tian also led the world's first robot-aided operation on a thoracolumbar spine fracture, one of the most common spine injuries, often caused by car accidents.

In both cases, the robots helped provide 3D images of the fracture and precisely place pins into the patients. The operations decreased the patients' exposure to radiation and allowed them to recover quickly.

"The positioning function of the robot system is like that of the global positioning system in vehicles, with more precision," Tian said on Monday.

China is the world's biggest market for robotics. Some 56,000 industrial robots were sold in 2014, up 55 percent year on year and representing a quarter of global robot sales, official figures showed.

The government has named robotics one of 10 key industries to develop in the next five years.

"The application of robots will help usher in a new era of high precision for medical treatment," Tian said. "It will bring China's medical technique to a new level." Endi