New horizons for patient safety: LIGRA (LIfe Guard for Robotic surgery Assistance) An interactive platform centralizing information and control in robotic surgery Operating Rooms

The present paper describes LIGRA, an innovative technological solution developed in the context of the SAFROS co-funded EU project. Its general goal is to improve patient safety during minimal invasive robotic surgery. Focusing on the risks introduced in the surgical workflow by new robotic technologies, the LIGRA project consists in the design and implementation of a graphical user interface (GUI), on top of a dedicated middleware for message transport. This GUI is intuitive, non-invasive and versatile. Being visible to the whole surgical staff and easily understandable, the interface monitors the status of all robotic components, informs about any potential dangerous situation and displays the needed steps to recover. In addition, LIGRA records the data sent by the components, allowing retrieving technical and procedural information about the surgery and the staff afterwards. Furthermore, it gives access to an interactive version of the World Health Organization Patient Safety Checklist that recalls the essential checks and verifications to be made prior, during, and after the surgery. The approach adopted during this contribution, justified by the lack of a similar tool in OR nowadays, is to establish a common framework, which could have an important positive impact on patient safety.