Making Safer Robotic Devices

• Publication year: 2021

William D. Kennedy, James D. Burger, and Frank A. Bruno ^*

This article discusses the intersection of robotics and product liability law.

"Robots are everywhere, and they eat old people's medicine for fuel." ¹

Robots are everywhere—but perhaps just not how everyone imagined them. For decades, the promise of robots brought to mind devices like R2D2 and C3PO, or perhaps Rosie the Robot from The Jetsons—autonomous, intelligent devices entirely safe for human interaction. Today, instead, robotic devices are becoming ubiquitous; augmenting human effort and intelligence in the military, industrial plants, health care facilities, retail stores, and in homes.

Robots Abound

Robotic devices perform repetitive and intricate tasks with greater safety, efficiency, precision, and accuracy than ever before. While many of yesteryear's robots had to be segregated from nearby people, vast technologic improvements such as sensors, cameras, operator communications, visual displays, and artificial intelligence have made robots more collaborative and interactive, able to work harmoniously amid both trained workers and untrained customers alike. The close proximity of robotic devices to nearby people suggests that robotic designers should focus on a feature that may substantially reduce the risk of injury: warnings.

Logistical robots have long worked in warehouses and distribution centers and are increasingly used in solving "last mile" delivery issues. In the sanitation sector, robots clean floors and vacuum carpets in high-rises, hospitals, and homes. Moving beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, robots using UV-C light disinfect and sanitize high-traffic and congregate-gathering sites like airports, office complexes, stadiums, concert halls, worship houses, cruise ships, and hotels.

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In health care, robots sanitize, clean, assist with physical therapy, and even deliver patient meals. In the operating room, robots are even more prominent. Robotic-assisted surgical systems must undergo a meticulous development and approval process overseen by the Food and Drug Administration's ("FDA") Center for Devices and Radiologic Health, Division of Surgical Devices. Intuitive Surgical's daVinci system was the first, and for a long time the only, general surgery robot-assisted surgery system, but other companies' systems are entering the market.

Asensus Surgical's Senhance system was upgraded to include an Al-based Intelligent Surgical Unit in 2020. Stryker's Mako system is a major...