The activity of the Robot-Assisted Surgery Group at KU Leuven as an example of smart healthcare in Smart City Leuven

This paper aims to investigate the issue of smart healthcare in Smart City Leuven using an example of the Robot-Assisted Surgery (RAS) group working at KU Leuven. The author sets the main research question (MRQ) “Do surgery robotics, represented by the RAS group, contribute to smart healthcare in Smart City Leuven?” and three supportive research questions (RQs): (1) Could we consider surgery robotics as a part of the concepts of a smart city and smart healthcare? (2) What is the specific nature of Smart City Leuven and its smart healthcare? (3) What is the activity of the RAS group? Respectively, this article is divided on the following three sections: the first part sets a theoretical background explaining the concept of smart city and the idea of smart healthcare; the second section presents Smart City Leuven and its key institutions in the area of healthcare system; the final part concentrates on the work of RAS group and its ongoing projects FAROS, ARTERY and GIFT-Surg. Methodology of this article is based on literature review, research of Internet sources, and a scientific interview with the Head of RAS group – Prof. Emmanuel Vander Poorten. Added value of this research is the discussion on the relevance of surgical robotics to the concept of smart healthcare by using the example of KU Leuven-based RAS group and Smart City Leuven. This article was written by Liliia Hrytsai, who participates as an Early-Stage Researcher in the prestigious international project REINITIALISE “Preserving fundamental rights in the use of digital technologies for e-health services” funded from Horizon 2020 European Commission programme under the Grant Agreement no. 952357. The author expresses her sincere gratitude to the REINITIALISE coordinators for the opportunity to participate in the project; to Prof. Emmanuel Vander Poorten for taking part in her scientific interview and sharing information about the RAS group; and especially to Prof. Helder De Schutter for supervising her scientific work during her two-month (June-July 2022) research stay in Leuven, Belgium.