Towards requirements engineering for a tumour removing robot: work-practice observation of surgical teams performing brain tumour surgery

In brain tumour surgery factors critical to success include the accuracy, expedition and consistency with which the task is performed; surgical robots have been developed to better meet these success factors. In this paper we describe preliminary results of a small, innovative, student research study, which is yet to be validated with subsequent user studies. Its aim is to identify requirements for the task of brain tumour surgery, toward a wider project considering the development of a tumour removing robot. 5 brain tumour operations are observed using the ethnographic approach of work-practice observation informed by an ethnomethodological orientation. 4 observations are noted and corroborated with examples in evidence. We conclude that this study has identified potential requirements for a surgical robot, which would not have been highlighted using traditional approaches employed in the field of surgical robotics. These requirements may need to be validated with user-studies before being added to a requirements specification for a surgical robot.