AI Replaces Tasks, Not Surgeons: The Surgeon-Machine Interface
Self-driving cars, phones that answer anything, and yet in the operating room, decisions are still made the way they were decades ago. Stanford’s Dr. Jay Park and Dr. Vivek Buch, co-founders of iQ Surgical, call what they are building the surgeon-machine interface: a real-time data layer that brings machine intelligence to the surgeon at the critical moments of an operation. Jay explains why surgery today is like riding a horse, why their team is on the augmentation side of the autonomy debate, and why AI can replace a task but not the human. Vivek explains why workflow barriers are the number one killer of any operating-room technology, and how deidentification, for the patient, the surgeon and the institution, keeps this data from being weaponized against surgeons. Former Cleveland Clinic CIO Edward Marx asks the change-management question, and the answer surprised the guests: some senior surgeons wanted more AI, not less. The episode closes on community, and an invitation to join their SMART Surgeon Collaborative.
Join the SMART Surgeon Collaborative. Dr. Jay Park and Dr. Vivek Buch have built a community of surgeons who want to practice data-driven surgery. You don’t have to be a full-time researcher: everyone can take part in AI research, and the collaborative helps PIs at different centres turn their own surgical data into research that is actually usable. They are looking for surgeon colleagues, collaborators and partners.
Join here: email Dr. Jay Park at jayjpark@stanford.edu
What you'll discover
- Cold open: surgery today is like riding a horse (Dr. Jay Park)
- Welcome: Dr. Jay Park and Dr. Vivek Buch (Junaid)
- From brain-machine interfaces to the surgeon-machine interface (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- The SIMI Lab, StartX and iQ Surgical (Dr. Jay Park)
- Why the operating room never got its AI (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- Ed Marx: from anesthesia tech to Cleveland Clinic CIO, and what never changed in the OR
- Surgery is still riding a horse (Dr. Jay Park)
- Autonomy vs augmentation: the surgeon’s job is the last to go (Dr. Jay Park)
- Is it fair your outcome depends on one surgeon’s anecdotes? (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- Where are we today, and in five years? “We don’t even have cars yet” (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- Workflow barriers are the number one killer of OR technology (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- AI replaces tasks, not surgeons (Dr. Jay Park)
- The surgeon-machine interface is a data layer, not a device (Dr. Jay Park)
- Will surgeons actually adopt it? (Ed Marx)
- Senior surgeons asking: “Where is my ChatGPT?” (Dr. Jay Park)
- Medical-legal: can AI be weaponized against surgeons? (Dr. Vivek Buch)
- The FDA is the floor, not the ceiling (Dr. Jay Park)
- Information giving, not decision giving (Dr. Jay Park)
- Community: the SMART Surgeon Collaborative (Dr. Jay Park)
- Thank you and close
Referenced in the episode
- The surgeon-machine interface (SMI): a real-time data layer for surgeons, independent of the hardware it runs on (Park and Buch’s research at the Stanford SIMI Lab)
- Autonomy vs augmentation in surgical AI
- Roelof Botha’s line, quoted by Dr. Park: “not every inevitable future is imminent”
- Intraoperative MRI as an example of capital-intensive, workflow-interrupting ways to get more information in the OR
- De-identification at the point of capture, for patient, surgeon and institution
- Radiology as the pioneer for software and AI regulation; “information giving vs decision giving”
- Stanford StartX and the Stanford GSB community
- SMART Surgeon Collaborative: email at jayjpark@stanford.edu
Medical disclaimer. This podcast is for general informational purposes and is not medical advice. Listening does not create a doctor and patient relationship. Views expressed by the guests and co-hosts are their own and do not represent their employers. No specific vendor or product is endorsed. No PHI is shared.