Validation of a surgical drill with a haptic interface in spine surgery

Real haptics is a technology that reproduces the sense of force and touch by transmitting contact information with real objects by converting human movements and the feel of the objects into data. In recent years, real haptics technology has been installed in several surgical devices. A custom-made surgical drill was used to drill into the posterior lamina to verify the time required for penetration detection and the distance the drill advanced after penetration. A surgeon operated with the drill and the same aspects were measured and verified. All experiments were performed on female miniature pigs at 9 months of age with a mean body weight of 23.6 kg (range 9–10 months and 22.5–25.8 kg, n = 12). There were statistically significant differences in the average reaction time and the distance travelled after penetration between a handheld drill and the drill with the penetration detection function (p