Tunisia Hospital Deploys ‘Robot Doctors’ To Save Health Workers From COVID-19 Infection

A Tunisian hospital has engaged the services of a robot doctor in the treatment of covid-19 patients, thereby limiting the possibility of infecting its health workers.

This was disclosed by Nawel Besbes Chaouch, a doctor leading the pulmonary department at the Abderrahmane Memmi hospital in Ariana, near the capital Tunis.

“It allows a reduction in contact with the sick and therefore the risk of contaminating personnel,” he said.

Recall that health authorities had said that contact or nearness are part of the ways through which the virus gets transmitted.

The robot allows medical personnel and patients’ relatives to make virtual bedside visits

AFP reports that medical staff at the Mami hospital also interact with a robot, manufactured by a Tunisian company and donated to the hospital to support their efforts in combatting the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, in a hallway in the hospital in the city of Ariana north of the Tunisian capital Tunis.

Local media also reports that the screen mounted at the top of the robot enables audiovisual communication with patients, who in turn can see and recognise the faces of those caring for them – an impossibility when medics otherwise have to use full protective gear.

The robot was developed and donated by Enova Robotics, a company specialized in robot design and manufacturing through combined expertise in software, based in the country.

The company had said it was part of a gesture towards limiting the spread of covid-19.