The Indian Institute of Technology, (IIT), Delhi’s I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics (IHFC), the Technology Innovation Hub (TIH) and iHub Anubhuti, the TIH of Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology Delhi (IIITD), have partnered to establish country's first Medical Cobotics Centre (MCC) at IIIT Delhi.
In the presence of Ashutosh Sharma, former DST Secretary, who was the chief guest and KR Murali Mohan, Mission Director of NM-ICPS, DST, both IIIT Delhi and IIT Delhi signed an agreement to set up the Medical Cobotics Centre.
According to the joint statements by the institutes, the newly established Medical Cobotics Centre (MCC) will be a technology enabled medical simulation and training facility for the resident doctors, which will also act as a validation centre for the research outcomes in the emerging fields of healthcare robotics and digital health.
Besides, the Medical Cobotics Centre will help in facilitating the training of other healthcare professionals, paramedical staff, technicians, engineers, and researchers.
In consultation with the leading doctors and experts from AIMS, New Delhi, Jodhpur, and other medical colleges, the training programmes will be designed.
Further, the training programmes will be at multiple levels (basic/advanced) and cohort-specific like urology, neurology, laparoscopy, and others but initially the training programmes will be limited to minimum invasive surgeries.
It has been notified that the first batch of trainees will likely be inducted in April/May 2022 with some of the basic training simulators, available in the open market, whereas the advanced surgical robots will be inducted in the next phase.
The Medical Cobotics Centre (MCC) will cater to the requirements of the medical colleges in the Delhi NCR region. Both IIIT Delhi and IIT Delhi claim that the MCC is also in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 for medical subjects.
The I-Hub Foundation for Cobotics (IHFC) and Technology Innovation Hub (TIH) of IIT Delhi will collaborate with IIIT Delhi’s iHub Anubhuti to develop advanced technologies in the field of medical robotics/cobotics, computing technologies desired in robotic-assisted surgeries, training, digital health, sensing and medical procedures.
The Department of Science and Technology (DST) of the Indian government funds both these innovation hubs.
