Robot Dentists? ... Ouch!!

Wow, a robot dentist.  Not true?  It happened!  In China, already!  A robot has successfully placed two implants into a live female patient to an accuracy of 0.2 – 0.3 mm. The procedure was only assisted by humans in its initial step: a dentist initially oriented the machine to the patient and programmed the correct measurements and movements.

Where’s the USA in all of this?  I thought that Africa wanting to become the first continent to be mercury free was aggressive … but now … the Asian continent has robots placing implants.

There are nearly 400 million Chinese in need of dental implants, yet just 1 million implants are placed each year. There are not enough qualified Chinese dentists to place this number of implants.  In addition to meeting this unmet need, robotics should also dramatically reduce error rates and complications.

As with other professional services like law and medicine, many people (globally) simply do not have access to dental services due to the cost of inadequate supply. Robotics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) fill this need.  Look for rapid adoption in China in the near term, and for those developments to filter into markets globally.