21 ms·

Robot dentist performs first human procedure

351 points by voxadam 2y ago

Noam45 2y ago
This would be amazing if it works and a great use case for AI & robotics.
bankcust08385 2y ago
I'm still waiting for the mythical dental cleaning robot that scrapes and cleans all of your teeth all at once.
siva7 2y ago
I'm not letting a robot for a dental procedure anywhere near my mouth and i suspect that most software professionals wouldn't either.
Mistletoe 2y ago
I’m simply too old and seen too many BSOD to ever allow this to be done on me. Also I just watched the Fallout episode with the Mr. Handy in it. The picture in the article of the robot hand moving a drill into his mouth fills me with intense dread. Maybe the younger generation would feel differently. I didn’t let my Tesla drive either.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- whynotmaybe 2y ago
  But you're letting your device auto update even though you might come from a period where you had to voluntarily and manually install a service pack or start manually your internet session by dialing up your provider... Like I did. I even remember manually mowing my parent's lawn when I was a teenager while there are now many mowing robots that wander around with several spinning blades. And what about having 2 tons Waymo's car wandering around without a driver? Are we getting too old for this shit?
- bluGill 2y ago
  > I didn’t let my Tesla drive either. I know how bad humans are at driving. I don't have a Tesla, so I don't know if I'd let one drive, but they only need to be better than humans not perfect. I just wish there was some unbiased source of data as to how good they are - the only numbers I can find come from those who have reason to lie (mostly Tesla, but other self driving car companies as well). There are rules around how medical software is developed and so if this is property approved by the FDA or equivalent I'm not worried - it may not be perfect, but human dentists are not either.
  - infamouscow 2y ago
    You must not have any experience working with medical software. This is lawyers checking boxes, nothing more. The people that actually wrote the software likely are outside the jurisdiction of the FDA and have zero incentive to treat the software any different than any other hastily organized project. After all, why would any of these people care beyond their paycheck -- it's extremely foolish to assume others hold the same priorities and values as you do.
  - galangalalgol 2y ago
    My experience with the recent tesla supervised-but-still-full self drive beta was largely positive. I have a cameras only Y with hw4. I think John Carmack will win his bet. I do think they need regional model modifications though. The way you drive in different places is different. In some places you can't signal that you want to change lanes or people close ranks. In others people make room. It did two stops at each stop sign in places that had no crosswalks, picking some arbitrary distance before the intersection to watch for pedestrians, then it pulled up to look for road traffic. Perhaps not a horrible idea, but humans around here don't do that so it confuses other drivers and pedestrians both.
- HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
  It only has to screw up and inflict harm at a lower rate than a human. Human dentists injure patients every day.
  - __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
    I don't think "lower" is enough. Human psychology requires "much much lower". It's not rational, but that's us.
- wrs 2y ago
  At least this is actual CNC software using math and geometry that somebody can find the bugs in. What terrifies me is “software” that is really just black boxes filled with floating point numbers and no one knows how it works, or when it won’t.
  - inglor_cz 2y ago
    IDK. Logically you are right, but humans are emotional. Just a day or so ago, here on HN, full of IT guys, there was a discussion about some Tesla autopilot crash. People were absolutely livid and demanded the impossible. Now - generic Musk hate might have something to do with it, but I suspect that it is not just Musk. We really react very unfavorably to machines wreaking havoc, while our tolerance for humans fessing up is somewhat higher.
    - Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
      > We really react very unfavorably to machines wreaking havoc, while our tolerance for humans fessing up is somewhat higher. Yup. Over 100 people die in car crashes in the USA every day. When a fatal car crash happens, it MIGHT make it to the local news. But a single car crashes while driving autonomously and it's national news for MONTHS. Now, I'll acknowledge that there will be statistical bias here. There percentage of cars driving autonomously at any given moment is likely less than 1%. But autonomous cars make different kinds of mistakes. They'll fail to identify the lines in the road correctly, or fail to recognize an obstacle. Meanwhile, humans will drive drunk, drive distracted, or have massive egos and drive dangerously because they think they own the road and everyone else is just in their way, or just simply be bad drivers that don't even look around themselves before changing lanes.
    - Rinzler89 2y ago
      Because we feel better when those humans can go to jail as a form of Justice since now that person gets to suffer in exchange for the suffering caused. Meanwhile we don't feel anything if the robot that killed someone gets decommissioned because machines Don't suffer.
whimsicalism 2y ago
It’s going to become increasingly apparent in the US over time the degree to which doctors & the regulatory state are blocking us from getting cheap new care. Already ML algos are more accurate at diagnosing melanomas from an image than dermatologists - but we will never get that tech because doctors are fiercely protective of their salaries and have captured the arm of the state to help them do so.
- marinmania 2y ago
  And the lowest hanging fruit doesn't even necessarily have to do with AI or robotic tech. In the US you need a prescription within the last year to buy contact lenses. European countries do not require this. Not only does this mean contacts are more expensive and come from fewer suppliers, but demand for appointments with eye doctors would never go down, even though a test of vision could easily be done now by an automated machine where you choose a series of A/B options.
  - slaymaker1907 2y ago
    Maybe for a basic eye exam, but they're also checking for things like glaucoma. Glaucoma in particular is tricky because you may not notice early on, but any damage done to your eyes before treatment is permanent. In my experience, the cost for glasses/contacts is mostly in actually buying them anyways. Therefore, I just go get my eye exam done and then just buy them online for much cheaper than any retail store. Supposedly the cheap online glasses aren't as good, but they're good enough in my experience and then I don't feel quite so bad when I inevitably lose them somewhere.
  - bluGill 2y ago
    The vison test is to ensure your eyes are checked for things other than what correcion you need. Though machines do most of that.
    - tredre3 2y ago
      For healthy adults a yearly eye exam isn't necessary. Forcing people to do it just to get a contact prescription is indeed a cash grab. But yes, they will sell it to you as being for your own good.
whatever1 2y ago
Does not even need AI. Simple algo: default: filling If too much filling: crown If crown failed: pull For each step don't forget to collect the cash. There I saved you 200k worth of training.
- SteveSmith16384 2y ago
  If (world_pace == false) solve_world_peace(); easy!
  - inglor_cz 2y ago
    Undefined variable world_pace.
xaellison 2y ago
1. I want a human drilling because I want empathy in my care 2. 90% detection rate on cavities isn't great
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  2 - based on?
  - xaellison 2y ago
    the article says that
    - whimsicalism 2y ago
      does the article say that 90% is 'not great'? i am curious what the human baseline is.
- jonhohle 2y ago
  Have you switched dentists recently? I have little trust in the profession (though I like my current dentist). Around 2008 every time I went in to the dentist she found cavities. I moved states between a bad diagnosis and getting any fillings and when I went to a new dentist I came out with a clean bill of health. I moved back and had a dentist that I trusted, she sold the practice and the new dentist started finding cavities every single visit. I switched dentists and magically those cavities were gone. Not only did I likely get drilled and filled superfluously, the first dentists fillings fell out or broke and needed to be replaced after a few years. If a machine was doing the work, economies of scale also create a large enough class that if the treatment is not effective the class can sue. Against a one-off terrible dentist with a small sample size, the chance of compensation for terrible work is almost non-existent.
  - avgDev 2y ago
    In the end dentist offices are businesses, and often dentists have small practices. I've recently listened to a podcast of a dentist turning consultant to increase numbers. Dude literally applied a lot of marketing tricks, tested them and analyzed the results. He did things like naming teeth cleaning, a "clinical teeth cleaning" or something along those lines. This resulted in an increase in cleanings. I guess he could be lying as he is now selling his services but the whole podcast felt disgusting.
rurban 2y ago
Dental repair is really nothing. Automatic welders are very common e.g. I've worked on automatic brain surgery robots, which really needs to be automatic. because 3d, tricky, and the doctor outside sees much less than the tiny sensors inside. but you can interfere and even invite remote specialists on remote duty to observe or handle the pedals.
- pier25 2y ago
  How do remote operators account for latency?
  - rurban 2y ago
    They wait and act slow. Latency is a big problem, but you don't need to react fast, just right. The AI helps in proper detection and reactions though.
- rscho 2y ago
  That's interesting! Up to now, I've never seen automated surgical robots. They're just big swiss knives with stereo vision, usually. Are there automated robots on the market ?
- onemoresoop 2y ago
  > I've worked on automatic brain surgery robots, which really needs to be automatic. because 3d, tricky, and the doctor outside sees much less than the tiny sensors inside. but you can interfere and even invite remote specialists on remote duty to observe or handle the pedals. Just curious.. Are these fully automatic/autonomous? I assume human supervision is required but are there steps that humans have to choose/decide such that the robot could not possibly work without any human supervision?
- veunes 2y ago
  I think both benefit from advancements in robotics and automation
spacecity1971 2y ago
Fantastic development (I’m in the dental field) As a side note; a Chinese team already performed an implant surgery with a “fully automatic” robotic system in 2017. https://time.com/4952886/china-world-first-dental-surgery-robot-implant/ https://time.com/4952886/china-world-first-dental-surgery-ro...
- arethuza 2y ago
  I had an implant done recently and I got the impression that the device used to install the implant although being held by the dentist was actually monitoring its position & orientation very carefully.
nerdjon 2y ago
Its cool tech, don't get me wrong. But maybe, before we remove any amount of comfort with another human being we look at wether all of the dental practices are actually backed by science (which there is some scruitiny over). But also going to the dentist already isn't exactly pleasant, the pokes, scrapes, drill noises, etc. Maybe we improve that first before sticking it in a robot? People already have a ton of anxiety about going to the dentist. Removing humans will make that worse. I realize this is early, but still. I feel like we skipped some things.
- maxglute 2y ago
  My friend swears his dog tooth paste was better at preventing plaque build up than human tooth paste and it got me thinking that big dentistry probably have incentive to not improve effectiveness of human tooth paste. Then I read the ingredients and it's pretty similar so what do I know.
- sameoldtune 2y ago
  I read the headline to my partner and they said “AI is here to make the dentist scary again”
  - FromTheSteppe 2y ago
    Haha, as a 3rd worlder; I'd much rather take my chances with a robot dentist than a dentist who's father has ties with the ruling class, who's father has bought their university sit, or who's father (allegedly) being a veteran of a war that was finished 34 years ago has gotten them a university sit.
  - nerdjon 2y ago
    Honestly... yeah. As someone who 5 or 6 years ago was not going to the dentist since the very idea of it gave me anxiety after having a particularly bad and damaging dentist experience as a kid. When I would to to the dentist I would have a fight or flight moment just sitting in the chair. (TLDR, I was told they were going to do one thing as a kid, but they purposefully lied to me and did something else thinking I would be less anxious about it happening... yeah that went swimmingly) The only way I got over that was being able to talk to the Dentist that I was working with, having them explain step by step what they are doing, they check in regularly, etc etc. I finally feel mostly comfortable going, to this specific dentist. The idea of switching has me anxious. The idea of a robot, while great maybe it could have less human error and all that. No... just, no.
jl6 2y ago
I hope this kind of “do a simple procedure in a complex environment” robotics leads to automation of high-toil jobs like fruit picking.
- nottorp 2y ago
  Fruit won't cooperate though, so it may be harder than dentistry.
ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
> There sure are some brave guinea pig types out there. You can say that again.
- smokel 2y ago
  Back in 2004, people had microchips inserted under their skin to enter their discos more quickly. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn5022-clubbers-choose-chip-implants-to-jump-queues/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn5022-clubbers-choose-...
apwell23 2y ago
I am more impressed by the guy who signed up to the be the test subject. get him on redbull youtube channel.
- avgDev 2y ago
  I'm 100% positive that if you came up with something "first in the world", but the risk of death was 50% during the procedure, you would find people willing to do it.
  - inglor_cz 2y ago
    The first expeditions to the South Pole come to mind. Not just dangerous, but arduous, long and in extreme cold.
josefritzishere 2y ago
This is not what I wanted robots for. The future is not Startrek. It's Blade Runner.
thih9 2y ago
> [OCT] cuts harmful X-Ray radiation out of the process, This seems unrelated to the fact that a robot is performing the procedure. Is there anything that prevents human dentists from using OCT instead too? Also, I guess X-Ray usually isn't part of the process in a procedure like this - but IANAD.
d_burfoot 2y ago
This is great news. Many people, even in developed countries, suffer a lack of quality dental care because of the cost. Once these devices become widespread, costs should start to drop significantly.
- smokel 2y ago
  Why do you think that? MRI scanners are still terribly expensive machines, for example. And in most countries, the hourly wage for a dentist need not be high. It is more likely that some robot company is going to make a fortune. Whether other people profit from that is an open question.
  - ZeroGravitas 2y ago
    There is apparently about to be a revolution in MRI, making them portable and cheap to run. I've only read pop science articles on it but I think the gist is to use software (AI!) to make up for a much weaker magnet.
    - progbits 2y ago
      There are fundamental signal processing limitations. AI will just hallucinate plausibly looking garbage and kill people.
- pkaye 2y ago
  Its not going to be cheaper than training more dentists in those countries.
drewchew 2y ago
Will robot dentists facilitate the option to lay face down for procedures so that the debris and saliva falls out instead of needing the suction tool?
- settsu 2y ago
  On first blush, this is an interesting premise. And it would seem to make sense once there is no need for human attendants, nor any potential accommodation for them.
  - cogman10 2y ago
    I imagine, particularly with V1, there's probably going to be human attendants for a good portion of the procedure. You'd want them for administering the numbing agent and positioning the machine for the procedure.
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    > And it would seem to make sense once there is no need for human attendants, nor any potential accommodation for them. Perhaps it could be combined with a back massage. Those chairs that you stick your face in would be tailor-made for this!
    - drewchew 2y ago
      That's exactly what I was thinking, you can lay face down on a massage bed for a pretty long time, so they should just be able to put the robot in your mouth through the face hole lol
- __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
  Wow that would be a game changer.
- candiddevmike 2y ago
  What if I like the taste of burning tooth enamel? Can I flip over still?
nharada 2y ago
Is there a tech version of "not in my backyard"? Like, "I support the idea but I'm sure as hell not going first"?
racl101 2y ago
Imagine being the guy testing this.
__MatrixMan__ 2y ago
Sometimes the drill is necessary, but imagine how infrequently we'd need it if there were robots in our homes that could do an immaculate job with the daily cleaning.
- ben_w 2y ago
  I have good news: https://www.amazon.de/s?k=electric+toothbrush https://www.amazon.de/s?k=electric+toothbrush ;)
  - agumonkey 2y ago
    They're indeed pretty incredible. That said I'm waiting for microcurrent brushes now.
  - sva_ 2y ago
    Waiting for the toothbrush that brushes all teeth at once in about 15 seconds
    - a_t48 2y ago
      They also exist eg https://sonic-brush.net https://sonic-brush.net - but they aren't very good yet.
      - moffkalast 2y ago
        That thing looks like someone pulled it from the depths of the ocean.
      - 8organicbits 2y ago
        Huh, you need to manually move that back and forth. I instantly assumed it would be electric. https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0099/9525/5889/files/SonicToothbrushGIF_88445776-884a-4cd2-8396-c6e514c062d7.gif https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0099/9525/5889/files/Sonic...
      - tssge 2y ago
krunck 2y ago
There is no mention of a feedback mechanism for the patient to express that the pain level is too high and something should be changed in method and/or anesthetic. And what about soft tissues? Does the robot image those so it knows there is a tongue in the way?
- cogman10 2y ago
  From the pictures, it looks like the dentist is positioning the machine so I'm guessing the administration of the anesthetic and ensuring the area is clear will be on them.
photon_lines 2y ago
Hopefully they also provide a pair of adult diapers for each test subject :)
cogman10 2y ago
I think what's being overlooked here by some commenters is the speed of this machine. A normal cavity filling can take 20/30 minutes. Imagine if that could be cut down to 1 minute with a perfect filling at the end? Even if we are talking about the dentist messing up the pain killing application it'll all be over pretty damn fast.
- MOARDONGZPLZ 2y ago
  Pfft. That’s nothing. Imagine if it was 30 seconds rather than twice that time? Can’t get better than that.
  - cogman10 2y ago
    The actual drilling can be quiet fast. The limiting factor is making sure it isn't so fast that it shatters the tooth. What will take time is bonding the filling. My assumption is that for a regular cavity fill, the drilling will be a much smaller portion of the time than the filling bonding. You can see that in the crown placement video in the article, almost no time is spent removing the outside tooth. The actual spent time is building up the crown.
- doubled112 2y ago
  Agreed. The freezing doesn't always work for me. If I say "hey, I can feel that" the second dose might work, and it might not. What happens next is that they slow down, and while this sounds like compassion, it also lengthens the time they're drilling into my head while I can feel it. Just building up a resistance to physical torture. Bring it on, movie CIA guy. I think a quick, very intense filling might be better than a long, slow one.
  - cogman10 2y ago
    I may be weird about this, but for me when I've been drilled (or even cleaned) and experienced tooth pain the level is 100%. I can't feel more pain. I'm certainly not advocating that dentists don't do their best to numb patients before drilling. What I'm saying is it's fairly likely that by the time they can stop the machine in the case of pain the procedure will be nearly complete and the pain over.
iandanforth 2y ago
I would be more comfortable with this technology if it had saw-stop like behavior. If I sneeze it has to be fast enough to safe the dental tool before I impale myself on it.
- gwbas1c 2y ago
  > Remarkably, the company claims the machine can take care of business safely "even in the most movement-heavy conditions," and that dry run testing on moving humans has all been successful. There sure are some brave guinea pig types out there.
rtkwe 2y ago
But will it carry on a conversation with me that consists entirely of open mouthed vowel sounds? I'm not sure speech recognition has gotten quite that far. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F7sWy4JQ18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F7sWy4JQ18
- ugh123 2y ago
  There will most certainly be a dental assistant operating the machine in various ways, and "managing the conversation" with the patient.
- hiddencost 2y ago
  https://sites.research.google/euphonia/about/ https://sites.research.google/euphonia/about/
- QuaternionsBhop 2y ago
  Who will be making the open mouthed vowel sounds? You or the robot? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qobhDJ_vEOc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qobhDJ_vEOc
  - rtkwe 2y ago
    Hopefully just me. I speak Dental Patient but I don't understand it.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
idunnoman1222 2y ago
Basically, they put the drill on a CNC machine. I’m not sure that AI is more than a buzzword in this procedure
deleted 2y ago
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sierra1011 2y ago
SO is a dentist. They laughed and said 90% detection leaves a lot to be desired, and there's rarely a good reason to not have an X-ray.* In addition, there's some things a human dentist does that I doubt this does - early detection of oral or skin cancer on the face being one of them. If you have the same dentist you'd be amazed at what they remember about your face and what's different from last time. General vibe is that even if it can technically do a drill 'n' fill, it has a long way to go before it can substitute for a trained medical professional. * Edit: I'm actually going to go further and say that calling an X-ray "harmful" should constitute disinformation and therefore wariness towards the attitude or motive of the author, since it's patently not true. The fraction they use at the dentist's isn't going to hurt anyone. The comparison point I've heard (and can't personally verify) is 6 dental X-rays is equivalent to 1 trans-Atlantic flight; alternatively 1 x-ray to a weekend in Cornwall.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > there's some things a human dentist does that I doubt this does - early detection of oral or skin cancer on the face being one of them I'm sure this can happen, but that's different to every dentist doing it. And a dentist doing harder to automate stuff while the 15 minutes go on instead of 2 hours means way more patients treated in the same time period, which means costs can hopefully come way down for some dentistry.
  - sierra1011 2y ago
    It's definitely what I'd like to see for the future, in the same way that calculators improved the capability and throughput of professional mathematicians; as a tool that assists to enhance and augment delivery of a service. CNC milling already exists for crown prep. The drilling of the tooth itself is not a long operation. The reason that a crown is split into 2 sessions is (depending on your local health board's practice guide) to ensure that the tooth is still viable for a crown; bleeding to stop, inflammation to go down. This revolutionises nothing... But it is a step towards a revolution. It can only be a good thing. However, in the same way that there's technically a lab-grown hamburger out there, it's not going to be commonplace for a while.
m3kw9 2y ago
Dental cases are deep and wide, I can see these robots doing the simplest and less complicated case of a single procedure and there are 100s of procedures
m3kw9 2y ago
At least 20 years before you get to see one in an office doing very limited procedures. The dental association isn’t gonna give this an easy path to replace human dentists
jcims 2y ago
Now who am i going to awkwardly avoid eye contact with?
daotoad 2y ago
Paging Simone Giertz.
user3939382 2y ago
Is it called the Therac-26?
anticristi 2y ago
There is something about the "moving humans" part in the article that doesn't hold water. From what I noticed, dentists use fingers 4 and 5 to track the movement of the head or jaw. I saw no such tracking in this robot, with the article simply making a handwavy "trust AI" argument. In general, I think if robots are to overdo humans, they should do that with improved sensors and actuators, not just "enough AI".
hsyehbeidhh 2y ago
[dead]
elif 2y ago
I'm way more interest robotic diagnosis than robotic treatment. It's so hard to trust dentists have your interest above their financial interest
- taneq 2y ago
  If the robot's decision-making process is transparent then 100% agreed. I just know, however, that (at least as long as state-of-the-art 'AI' consists of huge models trained on big data) the advice given by any free-on-the-internet bot will have built-in biases towards paid recommendations and similarly insidious things.
- xhkkffbf 2y ago
  What makes you think that the robot won't have a financial interest? The company that makes it will want a profit. The dentist that buys it wants to make a profit. If there's an AI under the hood, it might decide that someone needs to pay for its electricity habit. That being said, I agree that it's a difficult part of the fee-for-service model.
- idiotsecant 2y ago
  That's what second opinions are for. Not sure how a robot helps this.
- sunjieming 2y ago
  Whenever there's information asymmetry that financially benefits one party you have to be cautious. It's been shocking how many times people I know have sought second opinions on recommended dental work only to be given a completely different recommended treatment that's thousands of dollars cheaper. Example from a friend: Dentist 1 - you need ten fillings today! Dentist 2 - You have a few risk spots but let's just keep an eye on it. Went with the second recommendation and didn't have any issues and that was a decade ago.
- novok 2y ago
  That is what ChatGPT is turning into for many...
- herrherrmann 2y ago
veunes 2y ago
It is still would be scary for me. I think even scarier.
perlgeek 2y ago
90% accuracy for diagnosing cavities doesn't seem that great to me, would be good to see dentist's accuracy in comparison. Otherwise very impressive.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  I'd be surprised if dentists even make an attempt to be 90% accurate. Why be accurate when your goal is to make money, and suggest procedures, rather than be accurate?
  - Ylpertnodi 2y ago
    My dentist always gives me three quotes ‐ low, middle, high. And he explains the features, benefits and possible problems with each one.
amelius 2y ago
Let's first perfect robotic hair cuts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYKvjzWyYzA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYKvjzWyYzA
- isk517 2y ago
  Hair cut actually seems like it would be more complex than dental surgery. You only have about 32 teeth, they are large, and they shouldn't move around much. Compare that to 100,000 extremely thin strands of hair in varying length moving about all willy-nilly.
  - amelius 2y ago
    Did you see the video? The vacuum/suction method works pretty well here. Of course, trimming is a different story.
    - isk517 2y ago
      Yes, it is extremely impressive, especially considering it was made by one guying trying to come up with a hair cutting solution during the pandemic. Like you said in regards to trimming, more work would need to go into it to fully replace a hair stylist, and I was just pointing out that weirdly enough that might be more difficult than the dental surgery robot.
dwighttk 2y ago
Bob Mortimer will let you know all you need to know about performing your own dentistry: Fuji 9

351 points by voxadam 2y ago

Noam45 2y ago

This would be amazing if it works and a great use case for AI & robotics.

bankcust08385 2y ago

I'm still waiting for the mythical dental cleaning robot that scrapes and cleans all of your teeth all at once.

siva7 2y ago

I'm not letting a robot for a dental procedure anywhere near my mouth and i suspect that most software professionals wouldn't either.

Mistletoe 2y ago

I’m simply too old and seen too many BSOD to ever allow this to be done on me. Also I just watched the Fallout episode with the Mr. Handy in it. The picture in the article of the robot hand moving a drill into his mouth fills me with intense dread. Maybe the younger generation would feel differently. I didn’t let my Tesla drive either.

deleted 2y ago
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whynotmaybe 2y ago
But you're letting your device auto update even though you might come from a period where you had to voluntarily and manually install a service pack or start manually your internet session by dialing up your provider... Like I did. I even remember manually mowing my parent's lawn when I was a teenager while there are now many mowing robots that wander around with several spinning blades. And what about having 2 tons Waymo's car wandering around without a driver? Are we getting too old for this shit?
bluGill 2y ago
> I didn’t let my Tesla drive either. I know how bad humans are at driving. I don't have a Tesla, so I don't know if I'd let one drive, but they only need to be better than humans not perfect. I just wish there was some unbiased source of data as to how good they are - the only numbers I can find come from those who have reason to lie (mostly Tesla, but other self driving car companies as well). There are rules around how medical software is developed and so if this is property approved by the FDA or equivalent I'm not worried - it may not be perfect, but human dentists are not either.
- infamouscow 2y ago
  You must not have any experience working with medical software. This is lawyers checking boxes, nothing more. The people that actually wrote the software likely are outside the jurisdiction of the FDA and have zero incentive to treat the software any different than any other hastily organized project. After all, why would any of these people care beyond their paycheck -- it's extremely foolish to assume others hold the same priorities and values as you do.
- galangalalgol 2y ago
  My experience with the recent tesla supervised-but-still-full self drive beta was largely positive. I have a cameras only Y with hw4. I think John Carmack will win his bet. I do think they need regional model modifications though. The way you drive in different places is different. In some places you can't signal that you want to change lanes or people close ranks. In others people make room. It did two stops at each stop sign in places that had no crosswalks, picking some arbitrary distance before the intersection to watch for pedestrians, then it pulled up to look for road traffic. Perhaps not a horrible idea, but humans around here don't do that so it confuses other drivers and pedestrians both.
HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
It only has to screw up and inflict harm at a lower rate than a human. Human dentists injure patients every day.
- __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
  I don't think "lower" is enough. Human psychology requires "much much lower". It's not rational, but that's us.
wrs 2y ago
At least this is actual CNC software using math and geometry that somebody can find the bugs in. What terrifies me is “software” that is really just black boxes filled with floating point numbers and no one knows how it works, or when it won’t.
- inglor_cz 2y ago
  IDK. Logically you are right, but humans are emotional. Just a day or so ago, here on HN, full of IT guys, there was a discussion about some Tesla autopilot crash. People were absolutely livid and demanded the impossible. Now - generic Musk hate might have something to do with it, but I suspect that it is not just Musk. We really react very unfavorably to machines wreaking havoc, while our tolerance for humans fessing up is somewhat higher.
  - Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
    > We really react very unfavorably to machines wreaking havoc, while our tolerance for humans fessing up is somewhat higher. Yup. Over 100 people die in car crashes in the USA every day. When a fatal car crash happens, it MIGHT make it to the local news. But a single car crashes while driving autonomously and it's national news for MONTHS. Now, I'll acknowledge that there will be statistical bias here. There percentage of cars driving autonomously at any given moment is likely less than 1%. But autonomous cars make different kinds of mistakes. They'll fail to identify the lines in the road correctly, or fail to recognize an obstacle. Meanwhile, humans will drive drunk, drive distracted, or have massive egos and drive dangerously because they think they own the road and everyone else is just in their way, or just simply be bad drivers that don't even look around themselves before changing lanes.
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    Because we feel better when those humans can go to jail as a form of Justice since now that person gets to suffer in exchange for the suffering caused. Meanwhile we don't feel anything if the robot that killed someone gets decommissioned because machines Don't suffer.

whimsicalism 2y ago

It’s going to become increasingly apparent in the US over time the degree to which doctors & the regulatory state are blocking us from getting cheap new care. Already ML algos are more accurate at diagnosing melanomas from an image than dermatologists - but we will never get that tech because doctors are fiercely protective of their salaries and have captured the arm of the state to help them do so.

marinmania 2y ago
And the lowest hanging fruit doesn't even necessarily have to do with AI or robotic tech. In the US you need a prescription within the last year to buy contact lenses. European countries do not require this. Not only does this mean contacts are more expensive and come from fewer suppliers, but demand for appointments with eye doctors would never go down, even though a test of vision could easily be done now by an automated machine where you choose a series of A/B options.
- slaymaker1907 2y ago
  Maybe for a basic eye exam, but they're also checking for things like glaucoma. Glaucoma in particular is tricky because you may not notice early on, but any damage done to your eyes before treatment is permanent. In my experience, the cost for glasses/contacts is mostly in actually buying them anyways. Therefore, I just go get my eye exam done and then just buy them online for much cheaper than any retail store. Supposedly the cheap online glasses aren't as good, but they're good enough in my experience and then I don't feel quite so bad when I inevitably lose them somewhere.
- bluGill 2y ago
  The vison test is to ensure your eyes are checked for things other than what correcion you need. Though machines do most of that.
  - tredre3 2y ago
    For healthy adults a yearly eye exam isn't necessary. Forcing people to do it just to get a contact prescription is indeed a cash grab. But yes, they will sell it to you as being for your own good.

whatever1 2y ago

Does not even need AI. Simple algo: default: filling If too much filling: crown If crown failed: pull For each step don't forget to collect the cash. There I saved you 200k worth of training.

SteveSmith16384 2y ago
If (world_pace == false) solve_world_peace(); easy!
- inglor_cz 2y ago
  Undefined variable world_pace.

xaellison 2y ago

1. I want a human drilling because I want empathy in my care 2. 90% detection rate on cavities isn't great

whimsicalism 2y ago
2 - based on?
- xaellison 2y ago
  the article says that
  - whimsicalism 2y ago
    does the article say that 90% is 'not great'? i am curious what the human baseline is.
jonhohle 2y ago
Have you switched dentists recently? I have little trust in the profession (though I like my current dentist). Around 2008 every time I went in to the dentist she found cavities. I moved states between a bad diagnosis and getting any fillings and when I went to a new dentist I came out with a clean bill of health. I moved back and had a dentist that I trusted, she sold the practice and the new dentist started finding cavities every single visit. I switched dentists and magically those cavities were gone. Not only did I likely get drilled and filled superfluously, the first dentists fillings fell out or broke and needed to be replaced after a few years. If a machine was doing the work, economies of scale also create a large enough class that if the treatment is not effective the class can sue. Against a one-off terrible dentist with a small sample size, the chance of compensation for terrible work is almost non-existent.
- avgDev 2y ago
  In the end dentist offices are businesses, and often dentists have small practices. I've recently listened to a podcast of a dentist turning consultant to increase numbers. Dude literally applied a lot of marketing tricks, tested them and analyzed the results. He did things like naming teeth cleaning, a "clinical teeth cleaning" or something along those lines. This resulted in an increase in cleanings. I guess he could be lying as he is now selling his services but the whole podcast felt disgusting.

rurban 2y ago

Dental repair is really nothing. Automatic welders are very common e.g. I've worked on automatic brain surgery robots, which really needs to be automatic. because 3d, tricky, and the doctor outside sees much less than the tiny sensors inside. but you can interfere and even invite remote specialists on remote duty to observe or handle the pedals.

pier25 2y ago
How do remote operators account for latency?
- rurban 2y ago
  They wait and act slow. Latency is a big problem, but you don't need to react fast, just right. The AI helps in proper detection and reactions though.
rscho 2y ago
That's interesting! Up to now, I've never seen automated surgical robots. They're just big swiss knives with stereo vision, usually. Are there automated robots on the market ?
onemoresoop 2y ago
> I've worked on automatic brain surgery robots, which really needs to be automatic. because 3d, tricky, and the doctor outside sees much less than the tiny sensors inside. but you can interfere and even invite remote specialists on remote duty to observe or handle the pedals. Just curious.. Are these fully automatic/autonomous? I assume human supervision is required but are there steps that humans have to choose/decide such that the robot could not possibly work without any human supervision?
veunes 2y ago
I think both benefit from advancements in robotics and automation

spacecity1971 2y ago

Fantastic development (I’m in the dental field) As a side note; a Chinese team already performed an implant surgery with a “fully automatic” robotic system in 2017. https://time.com/4952886/china-world-first-dental-surgery-robot-implant/ https://time.com/4952886/china-world-first-dental-surgery-ro...

arethuza 2y ago
I had an implant done recently and I got the impression that the device used to install the implant although being held by the dentist was actually monitoring its position & orientation very carefully.

nerdjon 2y ago

Its cool tech, don't get me wrong. But maybe, before we remove any amount of comfort with another human being we look at wether all of the dental practices are actually backed by science (which there is some scruitiny over). But also going to the dentist already isn't exactly pleasant, the pokes, scrapes, drill noises, etc. Maybe we improve that first before sticking it in a robot? People already have a ton of anxiety about going to the dentist. Removing humans will make that worse. I realize this is early, but still. I feel like we skipped some things.

maxglute 2y ago
My friend swears his dog tooth paste was better at preventing plaque build up than human tooth paste and it got me thinking that big dentistry probably have incentive to not improve effectiveness of human tooth paste. Then I read the ingredients and it's pretty similar so what do I know.
sameoldtune 2y ago
I read the headline to my partner and they said “AI is here to make the dentist scary again”
- FromTheSteppe 2y ago
  Haha, as a 3rd worlder; I'd much rather take my chances with a robot dentist than a dentist who's father has ties with the ruling class, who's father has bought their university sit, or who's father (allegedly) being a veteran of a war that was finished 34 years ago has gotten them a university sit.
- nerdjon 2y ago
  Honestly... yeah. As someone who 5 or 6 years ago was not going to the dentist since the very idea of it gave me anxiety after having a particularly bad and damaging dentist experience as a kid. When I would to to the dentist I would have a fight or flight moment just sitting in the chair. (TLDR, I was told they were going to do one thing as a kid, but they purposefully lied to me and did something else thinking I would be less anxious about it happening... yeah that went swimmingly) The only way I got over that was being able to talk to the Dentist that I was working with, having them explain step by step what they are doing, they check in regularly, etc etc. I finally feel mostly comfortable going, to this specific dentist. The idea of switching has me anxious. The idea of a robot, while great maybe it could have less human error and all that. No... just, no.

jl6 2y ago

I hope this kind of “do a simple procedure in a complex environment” robotics leads to automation of high-toil jobs like fruit picking.

nottorp 2y ago
Fruit won't cooperate though, so it may be harder than dentistry.

ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago

> There sure are some brave guinea pig types out there. You can say that again.

smokel 2y ago
Back in 2004, people had microchips inserted under their skin to enter their discos more quickly. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn5022-clubbers-choose-chip-implants-to-jump-queues/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn5022-clubbers-choose-...

apwell23 2y ago

I am more impressed by the guy who signed up to the be the test subject. get him on redbull youtube channel.

avgDev 2y ago
I'm 100% positive that if you came up with something "first in the world", but the risk of death was 50% during the procedure, you would find people willing to do it.
- inglor_cz 2y ago
  The first expeditions to the South Pole come to mind. Not just dangerous, but arduous, long and in extreme cold.

josefritzishere 2y ago

This is not what I wanted robots for. The future is not Startrek. It's Blade Runner.

thih9 2y ago

> [OCT] cuts harmful X-Ray radiation out of the process, This seems unrelated to the fact that a robot is performing the procedure. Is there anything that prevents human dentists from using OCT instead too? Also, I guess X-Ray usually isn't part of the process in a procedure like this - but IANAD.

d_burfoot 2y ago

This is great news. Many people, even in developed countries, suffer a lack of quality dental care because of the cost. Once these devices become widespread, costs should start to drop significantly.

smokel 2y ago
Why do you think that? MRI scanners are still terribly expensive machines, for example. And in most countries, the hourly wage for a dentist need not be high. It is more likely that some robot company is going to make a fortune. Whether other people profit from that is an open question.
- ZeroGravitas 2y ago
  There is apparently about to be a revolution in MRI, making them portable and cheap to run. I've only read pop science articles on it but I think the gist is to use software (AI!) to make up for a much weaker magnet.
  - progbits 2y ago
    There are fundamental signal processing limitations. AI will just hallucinate plausibly looking garbage and kill people.
pkaye 2y ago
Its not going to be cheaper than training more dentists in those countries.

drewchew 2y ago

Will robot dentists facilitate the option to lay face down for procedures so that the debris and saliva falls out instead of needing the suction tool?

settsu 2y ago
On first blush, this is an interesting premise. And it would seem to make sense once there is no need for human attendants, nor any potential accommodation for them.
- cogman10 2y ago
  I imagine, particularly with V1, there's probably going to be human attendants for a good portion of the procedure. You'd want them for administering the numbing agent and positioning the machine for the procedure.
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > And it would seem to make sense once there is no need for human attendants, nor any potential accommodation for them. Perhaps it could be combined with a back massage. Those chairs that you stick your face in would be tailor-made for this!
  - drewchew 2y ago
    That's exactly what I was thinking, you can lay face down on a massage bed for a pretty long time, so they should just be able to put the robot in your mouth through the face hole lol
__MatrixMan__ 2y ago
Wow that would be a game changer.
candiddevmike 2y ago
What if I like the taste of burning tooth enamel? Can I flip over still?

nharada 2y ago

Is there a tech version of "not in my backyard"? Like, "I support the idea but I'm sure as hell not going first"?

racl101 2y ago

Imagine being the guy testing this.

__MatrixMan__ 2y ago

Sometimes the drill is necessary, but imagine how infrequently we'd need it if there were robots in our homes that could do an immaculate job with the daily cleaning.

ben_w 2y ago
I have good news: https://www.amazon.de/s?k=electric+toothbrush https://www.amazon.de/s?k=electric+toothbrush ;)
- agumonkey 2y ago
  They're indeed pretty incredible. That said I'm waiting for microcurrent brushes now.
- sva_ 2y ago
  Waiting for the toothbrush that brushes all teeth at once in about 15 seconds
  - a_t48 2y ago
    They also exist eg https://sonic-brush.net https://sonic-brush.net - but they aren't very good yet.
    - moffkalast 2y ago
      That thing looks like someone pulled it from the depths of the ocean.
    - 8organicbits 2y ago
      Huh, you need to manually move that back and forth. I instantly assumed it would be electric. https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0099/9525/5889/files/SonicToothbrushGIF_88445776-884a-4cd2-8396-c6e514c062d7.gif https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0099/9525/5889/files/Sonic...
    - tssge 2y ago

krunck 2y ago

There is no mention of a feedback mechanism for the patient to express that the pain level is too high and something should be changed in method and/or anesthetic. And what about soft tissues? Does the robot image those so it knows there is a tongue in the way?

cogman10 2y ago
From the pictures, it looks like the dentist is positioning the machine so I'm guessing the administration of the anesthetic and ensuring the area is clear will be on them.

photon_lines 2y ago

Hopefully they also provide a pair of adult diapers for each test subject :)

cogman10 2y ago

I think what's being overlooked here by some commenters is the speed of this machine. A normal cavity filling can take 20/30 minutes. Imagine if that could be cut down to 1 minute with a perfect filling at the end? Even if we are talking about the dentist messing up the pain killing application it'll all be over pretty damn fast.

MOARDONGZPLZ 2y ago
Pfft. That’s nothing. Imagine if it was 30 seconds rather than twice that time? Can’t get better than that.
- cogman10 2y ago
  The actual drilling can be quiet fast. The limiting factor is making sure it isn't so fast that it shatters the tooth. What will take time is bonding the filling. My assumption is that for a regular cavity fill, the drilling will be a much smaller portion of the time than the filling bonding. You can see that in the crown placement video in the article, almost no time is spent removing the outside tooth. The actual spent time is building up the crown.
doubled112 2y ago
Agreed. The freezing doesn't always work for me. If I say "hey, I can feel that" the second dose might work, and it might not. What happens next is that they slow down, and while this sounds like compassion, it also lengthens the time they're drilling into my head while I can feel it. Just building up a resistance to physical torture. Bring it on, movie CIA guy. I think a quick, very intense filling might be better than a long, slow one.
- cogman10 2y ago
  I may be weird about this, but for me when I've been drilled (or even cleaned) and experienced tooth pain the level is 100%. I can't feel more pain. I'm certainly not advocating that dentists don't do their best to numb patients before drilling. What I'm saying is it's fairly likely that by the time they can stop the machine in the case of pain the procedure will be nearly complete and the pain over.

iandanforth 2y ago

I would be more comfortable with this technology if it had saw-stop like behavior. If I sneeze it has to be fast enough to safe the dental tool before I impale myself on it.

gwbas1c 2y ago
> Remarkably, the company claims the machine can take care of business safely "even in the most movement-heavy conditions," and that dry run testing on moving humans has all been successful. There sure are some brave guinea pig types out there.

rtkwe 2y ago

But will it carry on a conversation with me that consists entirely of open mouthed vowel sounds? I'm not sure speech recognition has gotten quite that far. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F7sWy4JQ18 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F7sWy4JQ18

ugh123 2y ago
There will most certainly be a dental assistant operating the machine in various ways, and "managing the conversation" with the patient.
hiddencost 2y ago
https://sites.research.google/euphonia/about/ https://sites.research.google/euphonia/about/
QuaternionsBhop 2y ago
Who will be making the open mouthed vowel sounds? You or the robot? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qobhDJ_vEOc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qobhDJ_vEOc
- rtkwe 2y ago
  Hopefully just me. I speak Dental Patient but I don't understand it.
deleted 2y ago
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idunnoman1222 2y ago

Basically, they put the drill on a CNC machine. I’m not sure that AI is more than a buzzword in this procedure

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sierra1011 2y ago

SO is a dentist. They laughed and said 90% detection leaves a lot to be desired, and there's rarely a good reason to not have an X-ray.* In addition, there's some things a human dentist does that I doubt this does - early detection of oral or skin cancer on the face being one of them. If you have the same dentist you'd be amazed at what they remember about your face and what's different from last time. General vibe is that even if it can technically do a drill 'n' fill, it has a long way to go before it can substitute for a trained medical professional. * Edit: I'm actually going to go further and say that calling an X-ray "harmful" should constitute disinformation and therefore wariness towards the attitude or motive of the author, since it's patently not true. The fraction they use at the dentist's isn't going to hurt anyone. The comparison point I've heard (and can't personally verify) is 6 dental X-rays is equivalent to 1 trans-Atlantic flight; alternatively 1 x-ray to a weekend in Cornwall.

robertlagrant 2y ago
> there's some things a human dentist does that I doubt this does - early detection of oral or skin cancer on the face being one of them I'm sure this can happen, but that's different to every dentist doing it. And a dentist doing harder to automate stuff while the 15 minutes go on instead of 2 hours means way more patients treated in the same time period, which means costs can hopefully come way down for some dentistry.
- sierra1011 2y ago
  It's definitely what I'd like to see for the future, in the same way that calculators improved the capability and throughput of professional mathematicians; as a tool that assists to enhance and augment delivery of a service. CNC milling already exists for crown prep. The drilling of the tooth itself is not a long operation. The reason that a crown is split into 2 sessions is (depending on your local health board's practice guide) to ensure that the tooth is still viable for a crown; bleeding to stop, inflammation to go down. This revolutionises nothing... But it is a step towards a revolution. It can only be a good thing. However, in the same way that there's technically a lab-grown hamburger out there, it's not going to be commonplace for a while.

m3kw9 2y ago

Dental cases are deep and wide, I can see these robots doing the simplest and less complicated case of a single procedure and there are 100s of procedures

m3kw9 2y ago

At least 20 years before you get to see one in an office doing very limited procedures. The dental association isn’t gonna give this an easy path to replace human dentists

jcims 2y ago

Now who am i going to awkwardly avoid eye contact with?

daotoad 2y ago

Paging Simone Giertz.

user3939382 2y ago

Is it called the Therac-26?

anticristi 2y ago

There is something about the "moving humans" part in the article that doesn't hold water. From what I noticed, dentists use fingers 4 and 5 to track the movement of the head or jaw. I saw no such tracking in this robot, with the article simply making a handwavy "trust AI" argument. In general, I think if robots are to overdo humans, they should do that with improved sensors and actuators, not just "enough AI".

hsyehbeidhh 2y ago

[dead]

elif 2y ago

I'm way more interest robotic diagnosis than robotic treatment. It's so hard to trust dentists have your interest above their financial interest

taneq 2y ago
If the robot's decision-making process is transparent then 100% agreed. I just know, however, that (at least as long as state-of-the-art 'AI' consists of huge models trained on big data) the advice given by any free-on-the-internet bot will have built-in biases towards paid recommendations and similarly insidious things.
xhkkffbf 2y ago
What makes you think that the robot won't have a financial interest? The company that makes it will want a profit. The dentist that buys it wants to make a profit. If there's an AI under the hood, it might decide that someone needs to pay for its electricity habit. That being said, I agree that it's a difficult part of the fee-for-service model.
idiotsecant 2y ago
That's what second opinions are for. Not sure how a robot helps this.
sunjieming 2y ago
Whenever there's information asymmetry that financially benefits one party you have to be cautious. It's been shocking how many times people I know have sought second opinions on recommended dental work only to be given a completely different recommended treatment that's thousands of dollars cheaper. Example from a friend: Dentist 1 - you need ten fillings today! Dentist 2 - You have a few risk spots but let's just keep an eye on it. Went with the second recommendation and didn't have any issues and that was a decade ago.
novok 2y ago
That is what ChatGPT is turning into for many...
herrherrmann 2y ago

veunes 2y ago

It is still would be scary for me. I think even scarier.

perlgeek 2y ago

90% accuracy for diagnosing cavities doesn't seem that great to me, would be good to see dentist's accuracy in comparison. Otherwise very impressive.

onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
I'd be surprised if dentists even make an attempt to be 90% accurate. Why be accurate when your goal is to make money, and suggest procedures, rather than be accurate?
- Ylpertnodi 2y ago
  My dentist always gives me three quotes ‐ low, middle, high. And he explains the features, benefits and possible problems with each one.

amelius 2y ago

Let's first perfect robotic hair cuts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYKvjzWyYzA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYKvjzWyYzA

isk517 2y ago
Hair cut actually seems like it would be more complex than dental surgery. You only have about 32 teeth, they are large, and they shouldn't move around much. Compare that to 100,000 extremely thin strands of hair in varying length moving about all willy-nilly.
- amelius 2y ago
  Did you see the video? The vacuum/suction method works pretty well here. Of course, trimming is a different story.
  - isk517 2y ago
    Yes, it is extremely impressive, especially considering it was made by one guying trying to come up with a hair cutting solution during the pandemic. Like you said in regards to trimming, more work would need to go into it to fully replace a hair stylist, and I was just pointing out that weirdly enough that might be more difficult than the dental surgery robot.

dwighttk 2y ago

Bob Mortimer will let you know all you need to know about performing your own dentistry: Fuji 9