Consensus Benchmarks, Quantitative Assessment and System Interoperability for Medical Robotics Medical robotics and computer-integrated medical systems are a reflection of remarkable convergence of advances in biomedical engineering (from novel device- design to new modalities for imaging). NIBIB was established by congress to serve as an institutional means to allow for research advances in biomedical imaging and engineering to contribute in a profound way to the fulfillment of the mission o fthe NIH (Handee et al 2002). Hence from this perspective, the NIBIB is ideally suited to help foster the """"""""coming of age"""""""" of medical robotics and the help initiate a community-based discussion around the transition from research into clinical deployment. In particular, the proposed workshop seeks to focus the discussion around topics of """"""""System Interoperability"""""""", """"""""Consensus Benchmarks"""""""", and """"""""Quantitative Assessment"""""""" in the broader medical robotics arena. This discussion is a critical first step to allowing multiple stakeholders (academia and industry) to build consensus and to tranlsate research advances into practice. Hence, we are proposing to hold the first of a series of Workshops entitled """"""""Community Consensus Benchmarks, Quantitative Assessment and System Interoperability for Medical Robotics"""""""". This workshop series will annually alternate between the two major robotics and automation conferences: (i) the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) and ((ii) IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA). These conferences draw approximately 3000 attendees and are the premier forum for dissemination in robotics and automation (including medical robotics). Our first target this year is a Workshop at IROS'2014 in Chicago and the Call for Workshops is located at: www.iros2014.org/contributing/call-for-papers. We will build upon our upon our experience in organizing a very similar event entitled """"""""Formation of an IEEE RAS Standards Study Group on Surgical Robotics"""""""" at the 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Karlsruhe, Germany on May 7th, 8:00am - 12:00 noon. See https://sites.google.com/site/ieeerassurgrobstandards/ for more details.
We propose to initiate the first of a series of workshops at the 2014 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) in Chicago (Call for Workshops is located at: http://www.iros2014.org/contributing/call-for-papers). We seek to focus the discussion around topics of System Interoperability, Consensus Benchmarks, and Quantitative Assessment in the broader medical robotics arena. This discussion is a critical first step to allowing multiple stakeholders (academia and industry) to identify suitable candidates, build consensus and translate path-breaking/fast-evolving research advances into grounded sets of best-practices/benchmarks.
