Partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust offers thoracic robotic surgery virtual observership programme
Middle East Health speaks to Dr Nadine Hachach-Haram, CEO and Founder of Proximie, about the healthtech company and its mission to increase access to surgery globally.
Middle East Health: What is Proximie?
Dr Nadine Hachach-Haram: Proximie is a leading global healthtech company – digitally connecting operating rooms, globally.
The company’s mission is to deliver a connected surgical platform to help provide quality surgical care around the world.
By digitizing operating rooms, Proximie raises surgical standards via improved training and live feedback. This means the patient experience both during and post-surgery is vastly improved, as patients suffer fewer adverse events (in surgery) and benefit from improved recovery times.
Over five billion people – nearly 66% of the global population – lack access to safe surgery. Proximie helps resolve the significant variation in surgical quality and access – improving patient outcomes, saving lives, and also saving money for healthcare providers.
Middle East Health: Why did you found the company?
Dr Nadine Hachach-Haram: I founded Proximie out of a desire to help people and improve global access to surgery.
Growing up in post-war Lebanon, I saw first-hand the importance of surgical care – which has inspired me throughout my career – but also, the impact a lack of surgical availability has on patients.
Throughout my surgical career, I have spent years working on global health initiatives in the Middle East and other regions to help build sustainable health models, and providing surgical expertise in areas where it was lacking.
While my intention was to help as many people as possible, I was struck by the inefficiencies and the lack of impact I felt I was having. Notably, all the travelling and in-person meetings couldn’t replicate the impact of consistent, regular contact over a long period of time. My time with local healthcare teams was fleeting, leaving questions unanswered and surgeons not fully prepared to conduct the complex surgeries their patients needed.
Juggling all the travel, on top of my own surgical career, made me realise I needed to do something to make a greater impact. Combining my knowledge as a surgeon and familiarity with operating rooms – with a technology solution better meeting the needs of surgeons and patients across the world – seemed an obvious next step. After all, who is better placed than a doctor to create efficiencies and improve the quality of healthcare systems?
Middle East Health: How does Proximie’s technology operate?
Dr Nadine Hachach-Haram: From the outset, Proximie was designed to facilitate smooth interactions between surgeons operating in-person and observers via a multi-sensory experience.
Traditionally, surgical training has followed the ‘see one, do one, teach one’ approach. This is how I was trained and how many surgeons, globally, still are.
However, to meet the demand for surgeons and improve surgical standards – the surgical workforce needs to double by 2030. The whole approach needed to be brought into the 21st century.
My answer was to digitally capture operating room data. From there, the Proximie platform has expanded to include many further cutting-edge solutions:
- Telepresence: creating unlimited access to surgical procedures, allowing surgeons to share real-time guidance and expertise, insightful feedback, and improved training opportunities – while boosting efficiency
- Content management: creating shareable digital content from surgery recordings to improve training and encourage the distribution of innovative surgical techniques – all enabled via Proximie’s cloud-based content library
- Data insights: providing surgeons and hospitals with data-driven insight into surgical trends and techniques, helping encode and share best practices
Surgical recordings can be conducted via existing cameras, by Proximie’s state-of-the-art, turnkey, wireless cameras, via the company’s recently announced PxLens wireless headset, and by capturing inputs from medical devices present in operating rooms.
Proximie’s platform is device-agnostic. This means participants can join from tablets, phones, or laptops – whichever is easier.
Middle East Health: How will the new partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ function?
Dr Nadine Hachach-Haram: The partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in London, UK, is the world’s first virtual robotic surgery training course. It focuses on thoracic robotic surgery, demonstrating cutting-edge surgical techniques to observers across the world, thereby democratising and widening global access to advanced medical education.
Conducted over six weeks, the observership programme enables participants to view live surgeries via the Proximie platform, edit and annotate recorded surgeries to support engaging learning, and increase knowledge of best practice via tailored interactive learning modules.
The programme is open to overseas professionals interested in thoracic robotic surgery, costing £600 per week (plus admin fees) – a substantial saving on alternative in-person observership programmes.
To date, most applications are from the Middle East – testament to the desire of surgeons in the region to improve their knowledge and overall patient safety. The first cohort participating in the programme will begin 16 October 2023 with a further programme planned for 15 January 2024.
Given my own links to the Middle East region I am very excited for patients and surgeons to experience the benefits of the programme.
Looking ahead, I am confident the programme will provide a template for similar initiatives, helping share surgical expertise and knowledge across the globe.
- The Thoracic Robotic Surgery Virtual Observership Programme – Enabled by Proximie is available to overseas professionals who are not UK-registered.
- For more information, visit: https://www.guysandstthomasevents.co.uk/vpp/programmes/thoracic-robotics-vpp-enabled-by-proximie/
