On the morning of April 26, 2023, Scott Tackett, Vice President of Global Access and Value Development of Intuitive Surgery, Ben Forrest, Asia Pacific Director of the Global Access, Value and Economics Team, Usha Kreaden, Researcher of Biostatistics and Global Evidence Management, ZHANG Yanfei, Head of health technology assessment in China, and Professor SHI Lizheng, Director, Health Systems Analytics Research Center, School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Tulane University, visited Peking University Institute for Global Health and Development (GHD). Professor Gordon G. Liu, Dean of GHD and Development and Boya Distinguished Professor at the National Institute of Development, and P rofessor QIN Xuezheng, Associate Dean of GHD and Vice Dean of Peking University’s School of Economics, met with the guests at the Peking University Science and Technology Park office.
Professor Gordon G. Liu met with Scott Tackett
When welcoming Scott Tackett and his colleagues, professor Gordon G. Liu expressed that technological innovation is the core of sustainable growth in the healthcare industry and a key driver of comprehensive socio-economic development. Digital medical technologies such as artificial intelligence and telemedicine have seen breakthrough development and widespread application, providing unprecedented technical support for combating the COVID-19 pandemic in areas such as maintaining social distancing. Looking ahead, innovation in medical technology in the post-pandemic era will undoubtedly continue to lead the future directions of human health. Peking University Institute for Global Health and Development and the China Association of Medical Equipment have jointly initiated a large-scale public research project: "Survey of Medical Assessment for Robot Technology - SMART" to explore the market model of medical robot technological innovation and promote the development of digital healthcare to assist in building a “Healthy China”. This project systematically tracks and analyzes the clinical practices and development trends of medical robots through a real-world national cohort survey and Health Technology Assessment (HTA), thereby promoting value-based payment, empirical research, and applications of digital health.
Professor Gordon G. Liu explained the short-term and long-term goals of the SMART project: establishing the "Chinese Medical Robot Health Technology Assessment Network," implementing talent training programs for the evaluation of medical robot technology value, evaluating relevant regulations and policies, conducting projects for the evaluation of medical robot health technology, forming a specialized health technology evaluation framework for medical robots, providing annual reports on the development of medical robots, and offering industry development recommendations, etc.
Scott Tackett emphasized that Intuitive Surgical, through its subsidiary in China, has always adhered to the core value of "putting patients first" and persisted in the principle of "madeinChina, co-development, and global sales." Over the nearly thirty years since its establishment, Intuitive has created innovative, state-of-the-art products and servicesranging from robot-assisted surgical systems to data generation, which have the immense potential to benefit the global healthcare system. Scott Tackett appreciated the significance and systemic and innovative nature of the SMART. He also shared an overview of Intuitive Surgical's medical robot-related research collaborations with universities and research institutions in other countries and regions.
Both sides engaged in in-depth discussions and interactions on important topics such as the construction of the medical robot ecosystem, data security, patient privacy protection, and the development of a "decision support system for surgical robot procedures” for surgeons. After the meeting, the experts from Intuitive Surgical visited the Peking University campus.
Experts from Intuitive Surgical in the campus
(Jane Xie/Text)
