RIF Robotics: Surgical Instrument Sorter Robot

2022: Announcement

In mid-October 2022, hospitals in the United States began using robots that lay out surgical instruments in places. RIF Robotics aims to use a combination of AI and robotics to free healthcare professionals from the burden of routine tasks so they can focus on clinical work.

Sterile treatment, where cleaning medical equipment, is also difficult for technical personnel who have to spend several hours a day inspecting and cleaning instruments. Disinfection of some types of equipment requires more than 100 steps, and the pace of work in busy hospitals can be inexorable. Costs can also increase. Researchers at Ohio University estimate that just 20 tool errors that lead to delays in the operating room can cost the hospital up to $3,385. If extrapolated for a year, the hospital's costs will be about $48 thousand, the study says.

Hospitals start using robots to spread surgical instruments in places

RIF Robotics does not deal with the cleaning problem. But the developers claim their product, which was developed in less than two months, can save surgeons time by identifying, classifying and manipulating four different tools and assembling a small surgical tray. Two machine learning systems, an image segmentation system and an object classifier trained on sets of real and synthetic images of surgical instruments, help the robotic arm manipulate and move the instruments.

After further updating, ON future devices will be able to recognize more tools and determine the presence of remains of biological damage (i.e. blood and bones) on the surface of the tools, as well as assess the severity and general condition of the tools. But even in its current form, CEO DeMarco believes the company has created a product that hospitals will use.

As of October 20, 2022, the developers are working on the self-sufficiency of the product, DeMarco claims that the company's profit is less than $1,000 per month. But the team is not naive about the long road ahead. RIF Robotics is going to hold a preliminary seed round with a debt of $800,000 and hopes to hire a medical device expert after the round is completed. The company, which is in the revenue generation phase, also expects it will need three rounds of funding and about four years before it achieves profitability. The company intends to turn its product into an industrial one by the fall of 2023.^[1]

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