A woman has become the first human to receive a robotic limb fused with both her nervous and skeletal systems — and she’s being dubbed the “real bionic woman.”
Authors of the study, published in the journal Science Robotics, believe that the results can give amputees a bit of a silver lining.
The study is a product of DeTOP, a project funded by the European Commission under Horizon 2020.
“The DeTOP project offered a great opportunity of collaboration which made possible the consolidation of state-of-art prosthetic and robotic technologies available in our institutions, that may have a terrific impact on people’s lives,” Coordinator Professor Christian Cipriani, from Scuola Sant’Anna in Pisa, said.
Many amputees often choose not to get sophisticated, commercially available artificial limbs because attachment can be painful and uncomfortable, and they’ll have limited control over the limb — two of the worst obstacles with artificial limbs.
A multidisciplinary group of engineers and surgeons from Sweden, Australia and Italy wanted to develop an interface that would combat this issue.
The main challenge for researchers were the radius and ulna bones since they must be aligned and loaded equally, and there isn’t a lot of space for the components.
The intelligent, controllable limb has a skeletal attachment of the prosthetic, which was developed using osseointegration — a surgical procedure that involves putting a metal implant into the bone of a limb which attaches to a prosthesis, hopefully offering a better quality of life and improve mobility to amputees, according to Johns Hopkins Medicine.
Professor Rickard Brånemark, a research affiliate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and associate professor at Gothenburg University in Sweden, headed the study of osseointegration and has been working with it since it was first introduced to humans.
“By combining osseointegration with reconstructive surgery, implanted electrodes, and AI, we can restore human function in an unprecedented way,” Brånemark said. “The below elbow amputation level has particular challenges, and the level of functionality achieved marks an important milestone for the field of advanced extremity reconstructions as a whole.”
The robotic hand, called the Mia Hand, was developed by Prensilia, an Italian company developing robotic limbs.
The 50-year-old patient named Karin had her intelligent artificial limb fitted a few years ago after losing her right hand in a farming accident over 20 years ago.
“It felt like I constantly had my hand in a meat grinder, which created a high level of stress and I had to take high doses of various painkillers,” she told the South West News Service.
After her accident, the Swedish woman dealt with excruciating phantom limb pain, and the existing conventional prosthetic limbs were uncomfortable and not great for everyday use.
“The acceptance of the prosthesis is critical for its successful use. Besides technical performance, Prensilia struggled to develop a hand that could be fully customizable aesthetically,” Dr. Francesco Clemente, the Managing Director of Prensilia, said.
“Mia Hand was born to be shown and not hidden. We wanted the users to be proud of what they are, rather than ashamed of what was lost.”
“Karin was the first person with below-elbow amputation who received this new concept of a highly integrated bionic hand that can be used independently and reliably in daily life,” lead researcher Dr. Max Ortiz Catalan, head of neural prosthetics research at the Bionics Institute in Australia and founder of the Center for Bionics and Pain Research (CBPR) in Sweden, said.
“The fact that she has been able to use her prosthesis comfortably and effectively in daily activities for years is a promising testament to the potential life-changing capabilities of this novel technology for individuals facing limb loss.”
Karin got her surgery in December 2018 and started using the arm in the middle of 2019.
Dr. Paolo Sassu at the Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Sweden carried out the part of the surgery that rearranged the nerves and muscles in the residual limb to allow for more sources of motor control information.
“Depending on the clinical conditions, we can offer the best solution for our patients which sometimes is biological with a hand transplantation, and sometimes is bionic with neuromusculoskeletal prosthesis,” Sassu said. “We are continuously improving in both.”
Karin claims her bionic arm has been “life changing,” reducing her phantom pain and allowing her to regain independence and participate in everyday life.
“I now have better control over my prosthesis, but above all, my pain has decreased,” she said. “Today, I need much less medication. For me, this research has meant a lot, as it has given me a better life.”
“Our integrated surgical and engineering approach also explains the reduction in pain,” Catalán added. “Karin is now using somewhat the same neural resources to control the prosthesis as she did for her missing biological hand.”