Despite healthcare being a human right, adequate surgical services seem to be a luxury to a majority of the world’s population, with the The Lancet Commission on Global Surgery estimating that there are five billion people worldwide that lack access to safe, affordable surgical and anesthesia care when needed. Skilled surgeons are also in short supply, especially in isolated or developing areas. However, one American startup, Veyond Metaverse, is working on a revolutionary technology to help address that shortage by shattering geographic limitations for surgeons.

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Veyond Metaverse has created a platform, known as Veyond Connect, which uses Extended Reality (XR) to allow surgeons to collaborate surgeries remotely. XR encompasses a wide variety of technologies, such as augmented reality, virtual reality and mixed reality. Veyond Connect blends XR with digital twin modeling and haptic feedback systems to enable an expert surgeon to oversee operations on a patient that isn’t in the same room as them, and in fact could even be on the other side of the world.

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Veyond Connect facilitates interaction between two surgeons – the operator, who is in contact with the patient and performs the surgical actions, and the proctor, who is often a more experienced professional and provides guidance and instruction to the operator. Traditionally, both surgeons are in the same room, but the technology now allows them to be apart.  

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In 2001, Veyond Metaverse was established by Adam Choe, Joon Chung, and Dr Thierry Flam. Choe is a veteran healthcare industry executive, and Chief Technology Officer Joon Chung, a professor of aerospace engineering at the Metropolitan College of Toronto in Canada. In creating Veyond Connect, the company looked at technologies used in flight simulator programs and applied them to the medical and surgical field.

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By recreating the surgical environment in 3D and on the Metaverse, Veyond Connect will allow sufficient collaboration between the operator and the proctor, even if they are apart. It digitally replicates the patient and the surgical tools using digital twin technology and displays them to the proctor in real time. The instructions from the proctor appear directly in the operator's field of view using augmented reality, and the platform also allows users to interactively mark, write, or draw on the virtual environment, improving communication and collaboration during surgery. The haptic feedback feature provides tactile feedback to the proctor, replicating what they would experience when doing physical surgeries.

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These technologies differentiate Veyond Connect from existing solutions, which mostly utilize two-dimensional static technologies. Veyond Connect adds another dimension of realism, enabling more immersive and accurate surgical procedures.

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According to Choe, the Veyond Connect solution was designed  to increase access, adoption, and positive outcomes in surgical care while democratizing access to the best possible surgical care, which is in incredibly short supply today.  

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“Our platform aims to bridge the gaps between regions with unequal distribution of resources and surgical expertise. By transcending geographical barriers and harnessing the transformative power of the metaverse, we are revolutionizing the standards of surgical care on a global scale,” Choe says.  

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Aside from conducting actual surgeries, Veyond Connect can also be valuable in training surgeons virtually, extending the reach of experts’ knowledge into various remote areas of the world.  

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In September, Veyond Connect will demonstrate its capabilities by facilitating a surgery that will be conducted by an operator in Paris, France on a patient in Myanmar. The health needs in Myanmar has caused a huge shortage in medical professionals, and a large number of patients are unable to access potentially life-saving surgery.

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The surgery will be proctored by Dr Flam, a urology expert, Veyond Metaverse’s Chief Medical Officer and a professor at Saint Jean de Dieu-Clinique Oudinot.

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“Next month, we will demonstrate our Veyond Connect solution and usher in a new era in surgical medicine. By enabling long-distance proctoring of complex surgeries, we aim to help alleviate the suffering of people in areas far away from world-renowned expert surgeons. Beginning in urology, we soon expect to use Veyond Connect in orthopedic, heart, and brain surgeries, and, eventually, organ transplants,” Choe says.