Medical Jobs

How will medical robots impact doctors and nurses?

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Surgeries assisted by robots throughout the world are slowly on the rise, with the 100th robotic cancer surgery happening in February 2017. But as they become more ubiquitous it raises the question: How will robots impact the future of those employed in the medial profession? 

“I think there will always be a need for nurses and doctors,” said Michigan State University nursing junior Nicole Haist. “There is an increase in the amount of procedures done with machines or robots but a machine will never be able to provide patients with the therapeutic care that is needed to make sure a patient is continually cared for throughout the healing process.” Machines, while a great tool to assist doctors and nurses throughout the process, do not provide the human element that many need throughout the recovery period. “Nursing isn’t about the procedures,” Haist said.

Agriculture

New, improved robot fish designed for Great Lakes

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Capital News Service
LANSING — New and improved robot fish will soon track live fish and toxic algae blooms in the Great Lakes. This next-generation fish, going on its second year of development, is the third model built by Xiaobo Tan, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Michigan State University, and his research team. “We have a deadline right now to have two of these new ones done before summer, probably May,” said Cody Thon, a research assistant and a mechanical designer of the robot. “There is an algae problem every summer in Lake Erie, so it would be wise to bring them out and see what they can do.”

One prototype is already in testing at the university’s Kellogg Biological Station on Wintergreen Lake, in Augusta between Kalamazoo and Battle Creek, Tan said. “We were able to run the robot: Diving, swimming, going to certain spots, collecting data on harmful algae and temperatures, and send back that data to laptops,” he said.