and mid-level providers (or
even physician assistants)
playing a role. "Does it
require a doctor to lock in
settings and push a but-
ton?" he asks. "Why have
an MD doing 20 intravitreal
injections per day?"
In Dr. Schuman's view,
technology advances tech-
nique. "We can already cal-
culate and achieve ideal
outcomes for refractive sur-
gery and IOLs by plugging data into our machines," he says. Soon
those machines may provide tactile feedback on incision placement
and depth, while also decreasing tremors. "My expectation is, any sur-
geon would be able to operate at the level of a master surgeon, with
very little variability," he says.
The drive to deliver quality care efficiently and cost-effectively
may even reshape the OR, says Dr. Waring. He imagines the cataract
surgeon of the future sitting in the center of a surgical clean room,
surrounded by several small, self-contained operating theaters. Each
one contains a patient who's prepped and draped for surgery, who
the surgeon reaches through a membrane barrier to treat. "That way
the surgeon doesn't have to change anything, he just rotates to each
consecutive patient around him," he says.
5. Same-day bilateral surgery. Dr. Waring also sees efficiency
extending to the choices available to patients, with same-day, sequen-
tial, bilateral cataract surgeries becoming the norm when both eyes
7 0 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • J U N E 2 0 1 6
The cataract surgeon
of the future sits in the
center of a surgical clean
room, surrounded by
several prepped patients,
and reaches through a
membrane barrier to
treat each patient, revolving
from one to the next.
