Autonomous robotic platform designed as a labour solution to help with medical procedures

During the pandemic, the urgent need for a labour solution and the overwhelming demand on our health-care system sparked the creation Codi—Cobionix’s autonomous robotic platform that assists in medical procedures, with an initial focus on diagnostic ultrasounds.

“At that time, my co-founder, Dr. Tim Lasswell, was doing his clinical studies in medical school and saw firsthand how our highly trained health-care workforce was spending a significant amount of time on repetitive, low-complexity tasks, such as administering vaccine shots,” Cobionix co-founder and chief technology officer Nima Zamani says. “We thought, ‘Why don’t we build a robotic platform to handle these procedural tasks, so healthcare professionals can focus on more meaningful work at the bedside?’”

Codi leverages artificial intelligence (AI) to perform tasks like remote ultrasound imaging, offering real-time force feedback and improving accessibility for patients in remote areas. These robots aim to enhance health-care efficiency, improve workplace safety and reduce costs by facilitating remote operations and collaboration among clinicians.

Cobionix’s biggest hurdle was in ensuring the mechanical, electrical and software design all integrated seamlessly. (Credit: Cobionix)

With Zamani’s background in robotics and Lasswell’s engineering and medical expertise, they joined forces with a third co-founder, John Van Leeuwen, a serial entrepreneur dedicated to sustainability through his work in sustainable plastics.

End-user feedback was critical in Codi’s design and development. “As engineers, our expertise lies in electronics, mechanical and software principles,” Zamani says. “However, this often means we lack a deep understanding of the workflow and nuances of health-care staff in a clinical environment.” To bridge this gap, they sought feedback from clinicians and health-care professionals. “Their insights were invaluable in ensuring that our robot effectively meets the needs of those who use it while also providing an improved experience for patients.”

At present, Zamani says Cobionix is only one of three medical cobot platform manufacturers in the world. “What makes our robot unique from what’s available out there is the fact that we have a seamlessly built robot that is designed to be autonomous and scalable for future applications.” Codi is interoperable with different medical devices thanks to Cobionix’s “universal tool connector,” and when combined with their trained AI models to process the sensory data coming, Codi can interact with patients, equipment and its environment without user input.

“Existing solutions today require you to integrate a bunch of different third-party sensors and modify the robot for one specific application,” he says. “What you end up with is a Frankenstein solution and a single-use robot that can easily become obsolete.”

Zamani says Cobionix’s biggest hurdle in transitioning from the initial design concept to a fully functional prototype was in ensuring the mechanical, electrical and software design integrated seamlessly. “It’s one thing to design something conceptually. But in reality, things might not go as well together in the real world, and you have to be able to quickly adapt and iterate.”

When it comes to building Codi to meet medical and operational standards, he says Cobionix’s greatest strength was in having a well-documented and traceable process during assembly and manufacturing. “From top to bottom at our company, we’ve engrained in our company culture the importance of being detailed in everything we do, and that quality management is the number one priority when it comes to making medical robots.”

Cobionix is working toward obtaining necessary regulatory approvals and emphasizes patient experience and technological innovation in its solutions. “Since the beginning of the design process, we always knew we wanted Codi to be performing medical applications,” Zamani says. “We always ensured within our design principles and philosophies that anything we did from the mechanical, electrical and software standpoint would need to be compliant with the various medical grade product requirements.”