Researchers from University Hospitals Leuven and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in the Netherlands are studying retinal vein cannulation, a treatment that addresses the cause of retinal vein occlusion by removing the blood clot in the retinal vein.

The robot uses a barely 0.03 mm-wide needle to inject a thrombolytic drug into the retinal vein of the patient.The method requires the eye surgeon to insert an ultrathin needle into the vein and inject medicine to dissolve the blood clot.

A retinal vein is 0.1 mm wide – similar to a human hair -- and no surgeon can manually inject a drug into such a thin vein while holding the needle perfectly still for 10 minutes. The danger of damaging the vein or the retina would be too high.

Researchers turned to robotics technology for a surgical solution and developed a device that enables needle insertion into the veins in a precise, stable way. Once the needle is inserted, the robot can hold it still. The team also designed an ultrathin injection needle, with a point barely 0.03 mm wide (see video).

Eye surgeons at University Hospitals Leuven have used the surgical robot to successfully operate on a patient. A phase 2 trial will address the clinical impact for patients with retinal vein occlusion.