Knee Surgery Using Vuzix Smart Glasses
Pixee Medical is using Vuzix Smart Glass technology to revolutionise the way they do knee surgery.
In what Pixee have called the “Augmented Reality System for Total Knee Replacement”, the surgeon, fitted with Vuzix Smart Glasses, uses a reusable navigation instrumentation to guide the surgeon on joint angles, axis adjustments and distal cut control. The Vuzix M400 Smart Glasses provide real time navigation throughout the surgery displaying essential augmented reality information in the surgeon’s field of view. It also gives intraoperative feedback which is extremly valuable.
The use of Smart glass technology allows the surgeon to complete a Total Knee Replacement without percutaneous pins or intramedullary rods.
This was first performed in June 2020, by Pixee Medical, a France-based medical company, in partnership with Pr Remy Nizard from Hospital Lariboisiere in Paris, France using the Vuzix M400 Smart Glasses.
Preliminary results from the study have been published in an article in the Journal of Experimental Orthopaedics titled The use of Augmented reality for limb and compondent alignment in total knee arthroplasty” systematic review of the literature and clinical pilot study in July 2021. The results found that the Knee + system is accurate and effective to perform TKA.
The story made a great point that the introduction of RealWear and SWIS (Ford’s program is called SWIS, which stands for “see-what-I-see”) produced instant benefits when the Master Technician was tasked with solving an issue with the Ford GT where the cause was not immediately visible. By remotely liaising with their technical assistance center, the conversation yielded a solution that would fix the problem once and for all. Noting the advantages, Hershey stated,
This is more cost-effective, user-friendly and quicker. On one car, [RealWear] could save you a month. Without the SWIS device, they would just be guessing.
Ford wanted a premium level of customer service—and rightly so—for this very special sports car. Following its success with the GT, Ford immediately looked to apply it to their mass market vehicles. They soon rolled out the HMT-1 across the US, supplying up to two devices to almost 3,000 dealerships.
Find out more about Vuzix
To find out more about our Vuzix Smart Glasses technology and what benefits may align with you go to our Vuzix page. To speak with one of our friendly team, visit our contact us page.