"How Augmented Reality Gives One Doctor Surgical ‘Superpowers’" — Lisa Chamoff

Joshua Bederson, MD, professor and system chair for the department of neurosurgery at the Mount Sinai Health System and clinical director of the neurosurgery simulation core, describes his early adoption of the cutting-edge augmented and virtual reality technology that has revolutionized the complex brain injuries him and his colleagues perform. The technology helps them plan the approach and avoid damaging critical structures adjacent to the tumors they remove and aneurysms they repair. Dr. Bederson and the Mount Sinai Health System are on the cutting edge when it comes to surgical technology, and Mount Sinai’s neurosurgery department is also one of the first hospitals to take things to the next level by using the new KINEVO 900 neurosurgical visualization microscope from Zeiss. “I can identify areas in the Brainlab images that I want to navigate to or stay away from, and we’ll program the microscope to take me through the sequence of places that I’ve identified preoperatively,” Dr. Bederson said. The ultimate goal of the technology is to make Dr. Bederson’s job less daunting. “What we want to do is make it easier for the surgeon, to reduce the workload and bring some of this navigation and simulated information into the field of view in a way that allows us to keep flying the plane while getting that information,” Bederson said. “That’s really the next step of integration.” 

• Joshua Bederson, MD, Professor, System Chair, Department of Neurosurgery, Mount Sinai Health System, Clinical Director, Neurosurgery Simulation Core

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